Five Nights at Freddy's
by VampireQueenAkasha
Summary: Five teenagers explore the ruins of an abandoned mall where a great tragedy took place and five children vanished. What they uncover are more than just animatronics. They soon find themselves targets for vengeance. - M to be safe. - Acts as a movie.-
1. Part One

**Five Nights at Freddy's**

 **Author's Note:** So I've recently gotten into Five Night's at Freddy's and I enjoy the lore behind it. After some contemplation, I was able to come up with a "movie idea". Imagine how it would be played out if this game series ever had a movie made! I doubt highly it would be like my crappy writing, but here goes. LOL. Also, given the game's sensitive backstory and disturbing elements, read cautiously.

This was written specifically for my cousin - a huge fan of the series.

Read and review if you'd like!

 **By: VampireQueenAkasha**

~O~

 _"Terror made me cruel . . ."_

― Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights

 **Part One**

 _"Why...?"_

 _Only the soft, desolate sobs of the eight year old boy could be heard in the small storage room. He was huddled close to a dismantled animatronic; something with purple faux fur and disturbing rows of flat teeth. It was Bonnie._

 _Somehow they always terrified him. Their blank, silver eyes... Those perpetual grins..._

 _The sounds of heavy footsteps heightened the frightened boy's fear and he attempted to take cover beneath the animatronic's torso, just as the door's knob slowly turned. The boy struggled to calm his breath, tears trickling down his cheeks._

 _"Please..." he mumbled._

 _Sitting on a shelf was a sock-monkey style puppet with a white face, black hollow eyes; it looked like a Pierrot, with rosy red cheeks, purple stripes that stretch from the bottom of its eyes to the top of its mouth, and red lipstick painted on in an exaggerated pucker._

 _Bonnie was suddenly pulled aside by a gold-covered hand and the boy looked up with tear, streaked eyes. His agonized scream echoed into the night._

 _All that remained was the puppet; and a soft, forlorn whisper._

 _Why..._

O

It was a particularly cold morning.

Nineteen year old Emily was leaning against the van with a cigarette in hand, waiting for her other four friends to buy them early morning breakfast at the gas station store. She occasionally glanced down at her watch impatiently.

She pulled out her cell phone and flipped through a few photos of her and her boyfriend; one of the other teenagers accompanying her on the trip.

She sighed with disappointment.

A message had been saved on her phone and she opened it up.

 _GOOD MORNING. I HOPE YOU MADE IT SAFE. PLEASE CALL ME BACK WHEN YOU GET THE CHANCE._

A text from her mother.

Emily shut off her phone. Given how she was dealing with her family issues right now, talking with her mother wasn't really on top of her list.

A golden paw suddenly reached for her from the side and when it touched her shoulder, she jumped with a yelp and her fright was immediately replaced with annoyance.

The laughter from her friend eighteen year old Andy holding a Freddy Fazbear paw on a stick was the source of her irritation. He grinned and dodged a slap of her hand.

"Jesus, Andy!" she snapped, bending down to retrieve her phone; she had dropped it onto the ground. "What are you, six years old?" She gave her phone a few wipes of her hand. "You're lucky it's not cracked. I just bought this phone a week ago."

Andy continued to laugh. "Come on, Emily. It's just a back-scratcher!"

Emily's eyes fell on his purchase. "Where'd you even get that?"

Andy shrugged his shoulders, gesturing to the store. "They have this whole table of Fazbear stuff in there."

Emily made a face, studying the back-scratcher.

The Fazbear Pizzeria was the source of their interest and the whole point of their long trip. It was where several children had disappeared and were supposedly killed. Many stories had been made up about it over the years.

Mainly, legend had it that strange occurrence took place in the mall where the pizzeria had been located. Anyone who ever visited were believed to vanish without a trace.

Mark wanted to be one of the first to document their trip. He had been rather adamant about going. Emily had been Mark's girlfriend for a long time, but because of his obsession with the pizza place, it had put a strain on their relationship.

Emily rolled her eyes with a sigh and snatched the back-scratcher from Andy's hands. The teenager stared at her in protest.

"Dude, I paid ten bucks for that!" he protested, snatching it back.

"Ten bucks? I should hit you for spending that much on a stupid back-scratcher!" Emily snapped. She paused, considered that before smacking him over the head with it.

"Ow!"

Emily handed back the item before leaning against the van again. She gave Andy a look. "I thought you were getting us coffee."

"That's a Dean job, dude."

"Well, being an asshole just made it an 'Andy job'."

Inside the store, the other three teenagers were picking up necessities for their trip. Dean - a younger boy who controlled a video camera walked through the store. The other two teenagers, Amy and Mark were talking with the store clerk.

Mark was what Dean would describe as the leading mind behind their trip to the town. He had been inspired by a real tragedy of Freddy Fazbear's Pizzaria. And as Mark often was, he sought to explore the unknown.

Dean was just dragged along for the ride - and his equipment. He didn't believe that tragedies should have been dug back up in this way. But in a sense, his curiosity was something he could no resist.

"Yo."

The camera turned, focusing on Andy.

"Emily told me to get coffee." Andy said, peering over the shelves briefly. "You seen Mark or Amy?"

Dean cleared his throat. "They're talking to the cashier guy up front." He paused somewhat. "So why did Emily ask you to do it? I thought she asked me."

Andy snorted, attempting to be nonchalant. "Yeah? Well maybe she thought you wouldn't do it right."

"Whatever, man..."

Andy looked down and smirked, picking up a bag of candy and holding it in front of Dean's camera.

"Dude, they got Gummy Fazbears." he said.

The candy bag was colorful and bright; each caricature on the bag looked adorable, but Dean wasn't really convinced.

"I thought you said Fazbear's Pizza was lame."

Andy rolled his eyes. "It IS lame. But the merch you can sell on eBay isn't. That's why I'm all in on this trip."

Dean sighed and wandered up a chip aisle, randomly stopping and whistling the tune from a Fisher Price Music Box Clock. His mother had often played it for him while he tried to sleep. It was a pleasant melody for when he was a baby.

He stopped at a row of chips and picked up Sour Cream and Onion. Dean turned the camera to focus on his smirking face.

"Best chips in the world..." he said, quietly.

"...listen, I told you I don't want to talk about any of that."

The camera focused on the cashier and his name tag, which read "Vincent". The clerk noticed the camera pointed at him and his frown intensified.

"Why is there a camera?" he asked. "I don't give you permission to film me."

Mark glanced toward Dean and gestured for him to lower it. Dean shrugged with a sigh and did as he said. It wasn't like this guy was the first one to tell them they couldn't film or ask questions.

"Sir, we've heard about the Legend of Fazbear's Pizza and - "

Vincent sighed and rolled his eyes. "Oh. So you guys are just doing the same thing everyone else was doing." he snapped. "Listen, I suggest you go back where you drove down here from and just forget about that legend. We have enough problems as is."

"What do you mean, sir?" Mark asked.

A customer - and elderly woman - was standing by the cooler doors and looked at them with interest.

"Because of the murders and disappearances, we have tourists who come running through our town, making trouble with the locals."

"I thought tourism was good for small town businesses like this."

The customer approached them and tapped Dean on the shoulder. "Excuse me." she said. "I'm sorry, I couldn't help but overhear your conversation. I understand you're interested about this town."

Mark and Amy smiled at each other and nodded. Well, this was a pleasant turn.

"Yeah, we are." Mark replied. "Could you give us some information about Fazbear's Pizza and what went down? Maybe from your own perspective?"

The old woman's features wrinkled in a look of sadness. "Well, Vincent here - " She gestured to the clerk with a flick of her wrist, " - He is right about what happened. It brought a lot of tourism. Although, personally, I think it's inappropriate."

Amy frowned. "What is?"

"Making profit off of the deaths of those kids." the old woman answered, scowling as if she had tasted something horrible.

"So it really happened?" Dean asked. He seemed happy to hear that the legend had some credence.

"Oh, yes, of course it did. But there wasn't a single trace of evidence to track down the one responsible."

While they were talking, Vincent remained behind the counter with a magazine in hand, bored with the conversation. He scratched at a scar on his wrist absently.

"...it just doesn't seem right..." the old woman finished, disgust in her voice.

"But you think the increase in tourism has helped the town financially in some way?" Mark asked her.

She sighed, but seemed to agree with that. "It has, I can't lie about that much. I own a small produce stand in town and tourists do stop by." She shook her head. "I don't know, though; I still say profiting off of murdered children seems wrong."

Mark and Amy looked at each other briefly. In a sense, it was. But if tourism did help this small town, there was a small manner of benefit.

"I'm just glad they plan on demolishing that mall," the old woman muttered, passing them out the door.

She didn't catch the surprised looks on the faces of the three teenagers.

"Sorry, kids; I'm already late," she called back, with one parting glance. "Just take your mind off of that whole thing and leave town while you can."

After she left, the camera recorded her going into an old, run-down station wagon.

"I didn't think they still made those." Dean remarked.

"What was she saying, though?" Amy asked, quietly to Mark. "Are they really going to tear that mall down?"

Mark nodded with a disappointed sigh. "Yeah."

The camera was still pointed at him and Dean made a cautious sound.

"Mark, what are you thinking?" he asked.

O

A flicker of static.

Dean was talking with a person who lived in the town, trying to get a good interview with him. He was an older man who worked in a grocery store as a manager.

"So what's your perspective on the whole thing?" Dean asked.

The man stared at the camera briefly before he gave a sigh. "A lot of people want to forget about it."

"Have you heard about the Fazbear Snatcher?" Dean asked. "Some people around here seem to be calling him that."

The man made a face. "Yeah. I did. Some people seem to call him that."

"Do you think the mall is haunted?"

"Nah. I don't believe in that crap." the man said. "Only thing in that mall is just memories. Memories and bad dreams."

Another interview with an older woman, who seemed unhappy about telling her version of the story.

"Fazbear owned the restaurant." she said. "One day he came into my shop and he told me 'I'm done. I can't do this anymore, Margie'." She laughed sadly. "What did he mean? Well, nobody really knew. Not at first."

"Do you think he felt guilt?" Dean asked.

The woman nodded. "Probably. I mean, it was HIS restaurant where it all happened." she said. She finally sighed and looked away before continuing. "He went missing for a few days afterwards. So the police went to his house and found him."

"What did they find?"

"Well...he hung himself." she answered. "It was just terrible, it upset everyone. He said in a note he'd left that he couldn't take 'the voices talking to him'. He said that the kids blamed him for what happened."

Dean was silent before he continued. "So do you believe in ghosts?"

She nodded. "Oh, definitely."

O

Dean, Amy and Mark walked back to the van with coffee and snacks.

"We're behind schedule, but we all need to eat something before we go." Mark told the others.

"This is crazy..." Dean muttered under his breath. "No one listens to me. 'We shouldn't go here', I said. No, let's just...go in the creepy ass abandoned mall they're going to tear down in a few days. Is there a special extension at the mental hospital for that...?"

Andy was digging into a bag of Doritos while Dean opened up the van's side door to check on his inventory of cameras, radios, recording devices and microphones.

"Alright, now my mom doesn't know I brought this stuff with me," Dean told them. "So we need to be extra careful, okay? We may have enough battery power to run a country, but my mom isn't going to like it when I tell her something happens."

Mark nodded his head. Then, realization lit his face. "You didn't tell her?"

"No. Did you think my mom would let me go on this trip if she knew where we were going?"

Andy laughed between chews of his chips. "Dude, you're sixteen, man." he said, spitting chips down his shirt. "You still do what mommy says?"

Dean flipped him off.

"Andy, don't be mean." Amy scolded. She made a face and swatted some crumbs off of his shirt. "And clean your shirt..."

Mark seemed far more willing to hear Dean out as the other teenager rooted through his equipment to make sure he had everything there.

"Hey, so is all of this stuff really going to help us?" he asked, evenly.

Dean nodded. "I hope so."

Andy made false ghostly moans and waved his hands in the air. "You can do your weird Ouija board crap too!"

Dean sighed. It was too early for this. "It's not crap, Andy. My mother's a medium. She does this stuff all the time."

Mark patted his shoulder with a smile. "Which is why you're with us." He looked at Andy with dismay. "Just chill with him, alright? We're all together in this trip."

Andy rolled his eyes, raising two hands in defense. "Fine. Whatever."

Dean's mother worked a side job as a medium for the town they had come from. She sold equipment like this in the store. But she also strongly believed that spirits should never be tampered with or angered.

This was a harmless trip, though. And Dean had hoped they would be led on by a false legend and nothing more. Still, there was a small part of him that couldn't resist his curiosity. Morbid, perhaps.

"Alright, guys..." Mark said, gesturing to the van. "Let's hurry to the mall. We want to get as much footage as we can before the mall's torn down."

"How long do you think we have?" Amy asked.

"I don't know. But the sooner we get there, the better."

O

The camera switched on.

Mark was standing on a cliff-side overlooking the town.

Andy started imitating the opening music for the Lion King and Mark looked back at him skeptically.

Andy laughed. "Do you see the mall?"

"Yeah." Mark said, peering below. "Just a few miles."

The camera cut out, but briefly flickered the words "IT'S ME" across the lens. Andy grunted with annoyance and stared down at the lens, but saw no words this time. He tilted it around in his hands for study before looking over his shoulder.

"What the hell..." he snapped. "Yo, Dean! Your camera sucks!"

Dean was sitting on the bumper of the van before he rolled his eyes. Andy pointed the camera towards Amy, who was squatting behind some tall grass.

"That isn't Fazbear, you guys. That's Amy pissing." he joked, giggling.

Amy looked up, sensing the camera on her and scowled. "Andy, I'm going to kill you!" she shouted.

Andy cackled.

The camera filtered static for a few moments before Amy insisted that he erase what he was recording.

"It wasn't recording, I swear!"

"You're lying!" Amy looked over at Dean. "Dean! Erase it!"

Dean scoffed and took the camera from Andy's hands. "Alright, I'm confiscating this until you can all learn to respect technology."

O

Dean stared down into the camera, shaking his head with dismay. He focused it on Emily and Mark, who were talking in private near the van.

"...this is crazy, Mark. You know that..." Emily whispered.

"It's not crazy. I told you I wanted to do this." Mark argued.

"Mark, this is a little obsessive, don't you think? I mean we're in hick county with Andy." Emily protested.

Amy put a hand on Dean's shoulder, making him lose focus on the other two. "You shouldn't be listening." she advised.

Dean watched as she leaned against the wall of the hotel they had parked in. "So...are they still fighting?" he asked, quietly.

Amy sighed through her nose. "Yeah."

Dean glanced over toward Andy, who was talking with someone for directions. "You and Andy, then?"

Amy smiled a little. "Why do you ask?"

"Well, I mean... Andy doesn't..." Dean tried to speak appropriately on the matter. "I mean, you seem like too smart a girl for him."

Amy laughed softly. "Andy's a sweetheart when he wants to be."

"When does he want to be?"

O

Dean was looking down at the map, recording the entire time. There was a few places of interest he had circled, but the mall was starred and labeled. Mark was driving and Emily was in the passenger side.

Dean looked up at them before he shook his head in the camera, mouthing "drama" under his breath.

"So is this place going to be guarded?" Andy asked.

"Probably. I imagine they had a lot of people trying to get in." Mark said.

Dean was quiet for a moment, contemplating his words before he spoke. "Do you think that old lady was right about leaving?"

A sigh from the others.

"What?" Dean protested quietly. "I'm just saying, you know? I've seen a lot of horror movies that start out like this. And usually guys like me are the first to go."

"Yeah, and I already told you to stop watching them." Emily quipped from the front seat. "You have this nervous thing as it is."

"I do not have a 'nervous thing'..."

"You do. It's like a panic attack. Only...crazier."

Dean let out a sigh. "Yeah, okay. Whatever."

He sat back in his seat and said nothing more. But Andy reached out with the Fazbear backscratcher and tapped at his ear. Dean rolled his eyes and turned the recording camera to his face.

"Mom, if you find this..." he whispered surreptitiously, "I probably died. And with the one person I really don't want to die with."

He closed his eyes, making a face when Andy brought the back-scratcher up to one of his nostrils. The other teenager giggled and Dean simply shut the camera off.

O

Dean was dreaming.

He'd fallen asleep in the back of the van with the map over his face.

 _He found himself back stage at Freddy Fazbear's Pizza. From his perspective, he could see himself staring through several eye-holes of what he thought was a costume._

 _"Alright, the kids are waiting for you!" a man's voice said._

 _Dean tried to look around for whoever spoke, but the mask prevented him from seeing nothing more than a blue uniform and badge._

 _So he wandered from the back of the stage out into the play room, where five children were sitting on a bright, colorful floor cheering for him. The room itself was filled with decorations, cake and presents._

 _It was such a nice sight. It reminded the teenager of his childhood._

 _"Foxy!" they chanted. "Foxy!"_

 _Dean smiled behind his mask. It was the first time he'd felt actually wanted and popular like this._

 _The dream seemed to flicker like an old television screen and Dean found himself back stage again. Confused, he listened as a man's voice spoke the same message again._

 _"Alright, the kids are waiting for you!"_

 _Dean moved forward and once more, he parted the curtains and found the five happy children still cheering for him._

 _And again, he saw the flicker across his field of vision and he heard the man speak the same message._

 _"Alright, the kids are waiting for you!"_

 _But this time, he saw a man standing near the stage. A man wearing a purple uniform with a badge. He didn't see his face as the mask prevented that._

 _Dean was confused, but pushed the curtains aside._

 _There was no cheering and instead, Dean saw the five children lying dead on the floor. Blood had been streaked across the walls, the decorations were sprayed with crimson._

Dean awoke from his dream with a startled gasp and Andy was leaning down to him.

"Dude, wake up." he ordered. "We're here."

It was almost dark when they arrived at the fenced-in mall. Mark parked the van in the woods nearby, covering it with a tarp. Dean was a little disoriented and shaken by his dream. This didn't go unnoticed by Emily.

"Hey, are you okay?" she asked, staring at him with concern.

Dean nodded numbly. "Yeah. I'm fine..."

Once that was done, the teenagers approached the chain-link fence and peered around the abandoned lot. Dean carried a bag with only the necessary equipment they could use to record vioces and film.

"Dude, do you see the guards?" Andy whispered.

Amy shook her head, but her eyes widened and she quickly ducked. "I saw them!" she hissed, "Get down!"

The five teenagers ducked to the ground as a patrolling car drove by with two security guards. They waited until the car circled around the mall before lifting their heads.

"Mark, are you sure this is a good idea?" Dean whispered.

Mark nodded. "We can get inside, so long as we stay low and keep quiet." He looked at Andy skeptically as he said this. "Come on."

"I'm just saying. I won't survive in prison..." Dean muttered, grunting as he struggled through the fence. "I mean, you probably would but I'm the kind of guy they'd use as 'comfort food' you know?"

"Dean, shut up!" Andy hissed.

The group quickly squeezed through the fence and sprinted across the parking lot toward the mall. They stopped at a set of double doors and Andy tried to open them.

"Oh, really, Andy?" Emily quipped.

"Shut up!" Andy snapped.

Amy rolled her eyes and pushed them aside. "Move. I got this."

She turned, drew back her leg and kicked the window of the lower left door with her heeled boot. The glass shattered and the group immediately covered their ears.

"Well I could have done that!" Andy hissed.

"Do you think they heard that?" Mark asked, concerned. He glanced back over his shoulder briefly.

"Let's get inside before they come looking!" Emily whispered. "Go!"

They crawled through the shattered window and Dean was the last one through. Before he could join the others, he pushed a discarded box up against the broken window. The group stared at him in confusion and he shrugged.

"What? Just in case." he said.

They saw no point in argument, so nodded in a collection of agreement.

Taking turns reaching into their coats, they removed flashlights and switched them on.

The mall was enormous on the inside; most of the shops had been boarded up, some chained down and others filled with junk and debris. Possibly from squatters or just people who owned the shops who never returned for their belongings.

"Wow, check it out," Andy said, "This place had a KB Toys!"

He shined a flashlight on an old store with the logo in question overhead. A grin broke out on his face.

"And Radio Shack?" Mark quipped, focusing his flashlight on another shop. "Wow. This is serious old school."

Amy turned her attention toward a generator sitting near the broken-down escalator. Attached to it was a work-light stand.

"Hey, look at this," she said. "Could we turn this on, maybe? Get some light in here a little?"

Mark frowned and walked up to the generator, studying it. "Hm, maybe. I don't know, though. My dad has a generator like this and it makes a lot of noise."

"Hey, guys!"

They looked over and spotted Andy standing just atop the broken escalator. He was looking toward something with a broad grin on his face.

"I found it!" he announced.

The group walked up the escalator and looked toward the source of his interest:

Freddy Fazbear's Pizza.

The five teenagers approached the boarded up pizzeria, read the sign with images of the grinning animatronics.

"I don't know, this place seems a bit creepy for kids." Emily said. She read the sign out loud. " ' Where fantasy and fun come to life'?" She gave a scoff and grimaced. "Yeah, sure..."

Dean was reading the spray-painted message scrawled on the boards. Someone had written "Abandon Hope" in red paint. He furrowed his brow with concern and rested his hand against the boards.

"Someone's been reading too much Dante, man." Andy remarked.

Amy looked at him, feigning shock. "I'm amazed you know what that is."

"I read it in English too, you know..."

"Which you failed, as I recall."

"Yeah, how do you fail at English, anyway?" Emily teased, laughing.

Dean tilted his head at the message, ignoring the banter between the three. His head began to ring and he closed his eyes, wincing at the pain.

"...Okay, so we can probably just take these off with something..." Mark was now talking about how to get the boards off of the pizzeria's windows.

"I think... Hey, look, could this work?"

"Sure! Let's just take it off together."

Dean shut his eyes, catching a flash of something in his head that made him recoil.

 _A flash of screams._

 _Another flash of maniacal cackling._

 _Animatronics tearing viciously through something._

He recoiled with a soft gasp, nearly dropping his camera in the process. Mark looked over at him; they had taken off a piece of the board with a metal pipe and were ready to head inside the restaurant.

"Hey, Dean!" he said, "You coming?"

Dean nodded, struggling to calm himself. "Y-Yeah, I am."

The five wandered into the restaurant.

 _No..._


	2. Part Two

~O~

 **Part Two**

Dust and spider webs covered nearly every inch of the pizzeria.

Once the teenagers entered the decaying establishment, they immediately noticed a change in atmosphere as opposed to outside. It was colder here, but there was no chill in the air. Just a constant state of emptiness.

There were old games, prize counters with prizes still sitting inside the glass. Walls filled with cheaply made toys and everything else you'd come to expect from places such as this. Andy smiled and picked up a kazoo.

"Hey!" he said, "You guys remember going to places like this?"

Emily shined her flashlight on a poster of Freddy Fazbear. She made a face at the almost eerie caricature of the mascot. There were cartoon images of Chica, Bonnie and Foxy on an adjacent poster as well.

"Not like this, no." she replied.

Andy tried to blow on the kazoo, but eventually gave up and set it onto the counter. He glanced down, noticing a yellow Fazbear head lying in a corner on the floor. He smiled and bent down to pick it up.

Dean wandered around and stopped in front of a skeeball game. He chuckled and bent down, retrieving one of the balls. He turned it around in his hand before looking back up at the arcade game. A cartoon depiction of Chica grinned back at him from it.

This game he'd loved a lot when he was a kid.

Behind him, Andy was wearing the yellow Freddy head and crept up slowly. He raised his hands and gave a deep roar, startling Dean into throwing the ball from his hands. It rolled beneath a crane machine.

Andy was laughing and removed the Freddy head from his shoulders. "Dude, relax!" he said, "It's just an old head, man."

Dean sighed, rolled his eyes and tried to search for the ball he'd dropped. "Whatever..." he muttered.

"Hey, Dean! Andy!" Mark called, "Come on! We have to set up the equipment!"

"Alright!" Andy yelled back. "Hang on!"

Dean was still searching for the ball, moving his hand beneath the machine before he touched a scrap of paper. Curious, he pulled the paper out and noticed it was a child's drawing. The paper was faded with age and most of the colors stained by water damage. It depicted an image of what Dean could only guess was Foxy playing with children.

"Dean! Come on!" Mark said, firmly.

"Yeah, I'm coming!"

Dean dropped the picture and it fell face-down, revealing a message scrawled in crayon.

 _Help me._

Andy started to follow them, but stopped at the sight of a "Whac-A-Mole" game. The soft, felt-covered mallet was lying on the floor and he smiled, bending down to pick it up.

"Andy!"

Andy sighed with annoyance as Mark called for him insistently. He set the mallet down and followed him.

O

Mark switched on the camera in his hands and smiled down at the little red blinking dot that began to record.

"Hey, Dean," he said, "Does this look right to you?"

Dean walked up, took the camera in hand and switched a few settings before nodding his approval.

"Looks good." he replied.

Mark glanced over at Andy, who seemed interested in an old clothing shop. Amy was with him and they were talking together. She seemed amused by a few of his jokes, but he must have said something inappropriate because she slapped his shoulder next.

"Hey, don't worry about Andy," Mark told the younger teenager, "I know he's kind of an asshole, but he can be motivated when he wants to be."

Dean shrugged. He didn't want to seem like he couldn't take care of himself. Really, he had trouble doing so, but no reason for anyone else to notice.

"It's cool." he replied.

Mark smiled a little. "How do you keep cool all the time?"

Dean exhaled and set the camera on a tripod. "Well, you know... I'm used to it." he answered. "With my mom doing her thing as a Fortune Teller and working full-time at the shop. I've kinda just gotten used to being alone."

Mark thought about that. "What about your dad?"

Dean made a face. It was hard for Mark to tell if he touched a particularly sensitive subject. "Yeah...but I never met him." he replied, quietly. "He left when I was born, so..."

Emily carried in a cooler filled with drinks and food, interrupting the conversation. "Okay, the guards are probably gone for the night," she said, "I didn't seem them circling around. Still, we should probably be careful not to make a lot of noise."

Dean shook his head and sat down near the light that had cast the center of the mall in an eerie glow. He noticed an old sign that was lying on the floor.

He absently picked the sign up and read the happy message written on it with a smiling face.

THANK YOU FOR VISITING FAZBEAR'S GALLERIA. WE HOPE TO SEE YOU AGAIN!

Dean made a face and set the sign back on the floor.

"So what's the plan?" Andy asked, approaching them before he looked at Mark.

"Well," Mark said, "We could take the EVP recorders and maybe wander around the mall for a while. See what we can find. It looks like this place hasn't even been looked at in a while. Who knows? We might end up finding something no one else has."

His voice took on a delighted pitch at that possibility.

"Good idea. We can check that security guy's room," Andy said, smirking with glee. He gave Emily a look, as if he knew the whole story. "I hear he was the one who did it."

"I heard it was the night guy on janitorial." Amy added.

"Yeah, but he had an alibi, you know?" Andy pointed out, getting into the conversation, "I heard the security guy disappeared too. No one's seen him since it happened."

Mark frowned, as if it was the first time he'd heard of this new information. "What security guy?"

Andy winced at his error. "My bad. It wasn't the first guy. They hired another guy who was supposed to be the nightwatchman or something and he vanished."

"Some say the ghosts of those dead kids came back to get their revenge." Amy added.

Mark exhaled and gathered his flashlight. "Look, we can all talk about it while we look around, okay?" he told them, "Now I want us to stay close together. We go in groups and meet back here in an hour. Dean, Emily and I will look around on the first floor. You guys take the top."

Andy chuckled. "I always do." he said, strolling off.

Mark gave him a look and leveled his flashlight on the other teenager's face. "Dude, chill, alright?" he muttered.

Overhead in the vents, something quickly skittered by, catching the corner of Dean's eye. He quickly looked up, frowning.

O

Andy returned to the Whac-A-Mole game. He picked up the mallet and smacked a small caricature of Chica still sticking out from one of the many holes.

The machine let out a dying gurgle as he did. Andy laughed.

"Hey, Amy!" he called. "I think this thing still has juice!"

"Andy! Stop screwing around! We need to work!" Amy called from somewhere in another room.

"No, wait, come here!" Andy insisted.

"Andy, seriously!"

"Come on!"

After a few moments, Amy walked up to him with annoyance. "What?" she asked, "What is so important?"

Andy gestured to the Whac-a-Mole console and one of the Chica heads popped up. He grinned at Amy, who looked a little surprised.

"Wait, this place has power?" she asked.

"Guess so." Andy said, the relevance of that matter going far over his head. He was too occupied with the game.

Each time he struck the little Chica's that popped up, they uttered a pained grunt. A female voice chimed up from them.

"Ouch! That hurts!"

Andy laughed with delight and Amy frowned. "That's weird. How could it still have power in this place?"

"Dude, there's a generator outside." Andy said, distracted with his game. "Not really that weird if you ask me."

Amy gave up on the whole idea and threw her arms in the air with a huff. "Fine, whatever. Guess I'll do the work as always."

"Great. I'll catch up with you in a sec!" Andy replied, licking his lips with effort as he attempted to catch every Chica head that popped up.

"Ouch!"

"That hurts!"

Every strike against the tiny Chica's began to develop into more morbid cries.

"Ouch!" the Chica head's voice seemed to filter through static. "Ouch! ... Ouch..."

Andy made a face, pausing once.

" _Stop_..." the Chica head's gears groaned and creaked.

Andy grimaced and placed the mallet down. The game console whirred and the robotics within it seemed to creak painfully.

"Andy, seriously," Amy returned. "Stop playing around. I need your help in the security office."

She noticed that he looked unsettled and frowned.

"Andy?"

"I don't think I want to play this anymore, man." he said, somewhat uneasy.

"Good, then let's go."

Andy followed her, but glanced back briefly at the game console.

O

Andy and Amy walked through the security room; Andy was digging through boxes while Amy wandered around with an EVP Recorder.

A few kid's drawings were taped to the wall. The paper was worn and yellowed with age. Some of the drawing were extremely adorable to Amy; all of them were titled "MY FUN DAY!". She looked at one that depicted Freddy Fazbear hugging a child.

"So are you going to talk to him?" Amy asked, after a moment of silence.

Andy looked up at her before he sighed through his nose. "You know Mark won't talk to me," he told her, "He gets weird about it."

"Yeah, but it's just weird for us, you know?"

A figure walked passed the open doors.

A violet shadow, distorted in a form of Freddy Fazbear.

Amy frowned and looked over her shoulder briefly. She stuck her head out and glanced down the dark hallways with her flashlight before looking back at Andy, who seemed delightened by the contents of a box.

"Dude, check it out!" he said, pulling out old cassette tapes. "These are, like, prehistoric! Oh man, I wonder if they're the real deal."

"Why do you care about a bunch of old tapes?" Amy stared at him skeptically. "No one listens to cassettes anymore. Except for, maybe, my grandfather."

"Because if we find some authentic stuff here, we could sell them on eBay."

Amy raised an eyebrow. "So you're only going on this trip to collect stuff?"

"Duh!"

Amy knelt down and picked one of them up, turning it in her hands for study. Most of them had labels ripped off. One in particular had been scratched out in black marker and replaced with red ink that spelled out: LIAR.

"Aww man, someone scribbled on this one..." Andy protested, holding the tape out to her.

Suddenly, the sound of a child-like laugh filled the air, startling the two. Amy gave a cry and brought her flashlight up, pointing it in the direction of the closet nearby.

"What was that?" she asked, suddenly uneasy.

Andy stood up, frowning. "Hang on."

He approached the closet and opened it, but the two relaxed at the sight of a puppet lying on the floor, beneath several purple security guard coats. Andy gave a laugh and bent down to pick it up.

The sockmonkey style puppet's white face was cracked a little; there were two purple stripes that stretched from the bottom of its eyes to the top of its mouth. It had red lipstick that was faded with age.

"Huh. It's one of those weird little puppets my grandmother used to have in her attic," Amy remarked, "Well, something like it."

Andy chuckled. "I remember this creepy little guy. He was one of the pizza place's mascots or something."

Amy reached into the closet, studying the coats. She ran her fingertips over the worn leather and touched one of the name badges that read "Mike Schmidt".

"Hey." she said, "Who's Mike Schmidt?"

Andy shrugged his shoulders. "I don't know. Some guy who disappeared, I think. Hey, let's find the others and show them what we found!"

He carried the puppet under his arm and Amy continued recording on the EVP device that Dean had given her to use.

The light had flickered on and off several times, but it went by unnoticed.

O

Dean wandered toward the party room, where most of the banners had been torn down. It looked like it had been frozen in time; several plates, hats and pictures still filled the room. It left it in a very eerie condition.

The sound of footsteps behind him made him whirl with a sharp gasp. A hallway further ahead was empty, but he could have sworn he'd seen something run by him. Something small.

"Mark?" he said.

 _...Come here. Let me show you something._

Dean squeezed his eyes shut, mumbling 'no' under his breath. He saw brief, unwanted flashes of images in his head. The razor-sharp endoskeletons for the animatronics. The glowing eyes.

 _...Come on. It'll be lot of fun..._

Dean couldn't stop his feet from moving forward; he barely made out the sound of high pitched, jittery giggling. He passed a poster on the wall that showed a yellow Freddy Fazbear head without its eyes.

 _...We know you can hear us..._

Dean turned a corner and a flash of a yellow Freddy Fazbear appeared in his field of vision. He covered his eyes with both hands, mumbling 'they can't hurt me'. His mother had told him of these things. Of how seeing images such as this were just 'scary pictures in your head'.

But she never knew that he could actually see them. She never knew because he never told her.

Or anyone else.

Dean opened his eyes and found himself shocked to see a yellow Golden Fredbear standing there. Without its eyes and wires sticking out from its empty sockets. Its head occasionally flicked and twitched like something out of Jacob's Ladder.

 _Want to see a magic trick, kid?_

Dean shook his head with a frightened murmur at the low, almost sick-sounding male voice that filled his head. His stomach felt as though it dropped a thousand feet. He was frozen, unable to move and look away from what he was seeing.

But the Golden Fredbear simply ignored the gesture, reached up with two hands. Each movement caused the joints to creak horribly. Ethereal moans and broken pleas of anguish filled the air, but Dean wasn't sure if it was the horrible thing in front of him or something else.

The Golden Fredbear grasped both sides of his head and began to pull upwards. Sticky, horrid sounds filled the air and Dean shut his eyes with a sharp cry of fright.

Another scream.

A plea for mercy.

A beastly snarl of rage.

 _Look at me! Look what you've wrought!_

Emily put a hand on Dean's shoulder, drawing another shriek from him. She looked concerned.

"Whoa! Hey, Dean, relax!" she said. "It's just me."

Dean looked over his shoulder and the Golden Fredbear was gone. He looked back at Emily and gave her a nervous chuckle.

"Jesus, you're sweating," she pointed out, studying his sweat-soaked cheeks, "Are you sure you're okay?"

"I'm fine. I'm fine." Dean insisted, wiping his face on his coat sleeve.

"Don't walk off like that, okay?" Emily said, gently. "We can't be too careful here. This place is old. We don't know what might fall apart."

 _...Or end up pulled apart..._

A sinister giggle filled Dean's head, but he simply shook it away and nodded to Emily, resuming a calm expression. A poor attempt, however, because Emily put an arm around his shoulders and ushered him back to the others.

"Come on. Mark's found something. Let's check it out." she said.

O

The door had been locked.

Well, not just locked. Heavy chains and padlocks had been used to reinforce it, along with the words scrawled in red paint near the walls.

DO NOT OPEN.

KEEP LOCKED PLEASE.

NEVER OPEN. NEVER AGAIN.

Mark tried to seek inside the window of the door, but it had been painted over with black paint, making it impossible.

"So what do you think it is?" Mark asked, looking back at his friends.

"Something someone definitely doesn't want anyone to look at," Dean pointed out. He heard a collection of whispers fill his head and he winced, closing his eyes briefly before continuing. "Maybe the warnings are there for a reason, though..."

Mark raised his eyebrows. "Or maybe someone's just screwing around. Come on, let's see if we can get it open."

Emily and Mark moved to try and tug the chains loose, but the water damage from the ceiling and age had left them rusted. Dean simply watched, uneasy and suddenly sick to his stomach.

"Hang on, where's Andy?" Mark asked, looking around.

Andy was standing by the generator, trying to connect the equipment they needed to get started up. He struggled to get one of the old tapes fitted into the player.

A few clicks and the tape started up. Andy failed to notice a figure approaching him slowly. Hunched and breathing heavily.

He turned around with a grunt, but nothing was there.

 _"Hello, hello? Uh, I wanted to record a message for you to help you get settled in on your first night!"_ the tape played a male voice. _"Um, I actually worked in that office before you. I'm finishing up my last week now, as a matter of fact. So, I know it can be a bit overwhelming, but I'm here to tell you there's nothing to worry about. Uh, you'll do fine. So, let's just focus on getting you through your first week. Okay?"_

Behind the door they had attempted to open rested a Spring Lock Bonnie suit, trapped in the stages of decay. Most of its yellow-green faux fur had been rotted away and one of the ears was missing.


	3. Part Three

~O~

 **Part Three**

Dean was toying with the puppet that Andy had picked up from the security room. Something about it interested him.

"So did you guys find anything?" Mark asked, looking at Andy and Amy.

Andy smiled and nodded his head. "Yeah, I found those old tapes," he said, gesturing to the piles of tapes near him.

Amy held out the EVP device. "I'm not sure what might be on here."

"Let's check it out," Mark replied. He looked at Dean.

The other teen simply gave a sigh and nodded, setting the puppet down at his side. "Yeah, hold on a minute."

He took the device and began to set up the equipment. Mark suddenly winced and looked at Emily.

"Hey, I have to use it real quick," he whispered.

Emily raised an eyebrow. "Where are you going?"

Mark shrugged. "I'll be around the corner."

"Mark, that's nasty." Emily said, grimacing with disgust.

"What? I'm going to use a bottle."

He picked up an empty water bottle, shaking it for emphasis before he wandered down the darkness of the mall, flashlight in hand.

Dean started up the recording that Amy had received. At first, all that played back was the conversation she was having with Andy.

 _"Dude, check it out! These are, like, prehistoric!"_

Shuffling; the sound of the two moving around the security office.

 _"Did they let kids run around in here or something?"_

Amy smiled at Emily. "We found these messages written on the tapes."

The sound of laughter filled the air from the recording and Dean furrowed his brow. Amy and Andy smiled triumphantly.

"I knew we didn't just hear it!" Amy said.

Emily looked at Dean. The other teenager didn't seem as happy about the find as the two did. In fact, he looked troubled.

 _"What was that?"_

 _"Hang on."_

The sound over the recording played back the noises of Andy opening the closet door. Then his laugh and Amy reiterating her grandmother's ownership of a puppet.

Dean had almost gotten bored with the conversation until he leaned forward.

"Wait." he said.

The three looked at him curiously.

"What is it?" Emily asked.

"I thought I heard something."

"Really?" Amy looked somewhat pleased.

"Hold on." Dean said. "Let me try something."

He used his laptop to bring up the audio file. He played it back before stopping at one particular spot.

"Look." he told them. "Listen."

He played it back again, but all the three could hear was the sounds of Amy and Andy's retreating footsteps.

"I don't hear anything." Emily said, tilting her ear close to the speaker of the laptop. Then, her features lit up. "Wait..."

"What is it?" Amy asked, all humor gone.

She leaned in close to hear also and Andy joined in.

Dean tried to adjust the volume and pitch.

It was difficult to make out.

 _"...Get out..."_

O

Vincent was leaving the gas station for the night, locking up the store.

"Hey, Vincent!"

He turned slightly with a sigh, not really interested in speaking to the same old woman who had spoken to the teenagers. Stupid kids... They always had to get her talking about old legends.

"What is it now?" he asked, looking at her as she approached.

The woman stared at him gravely. She had just stepped out of her car and was walking up to him. She was holding a newspaper in her hand.

"Look!" she said.

Vincent took the newspaper and noticed that there was an article about the Fazbear Galleria. It was set to be demolished in five days. But that wasn't what interested him. Supposedly, the case of the Missing Children was going to be reopen.

The old woman smiled, seemingly delighted now. "New evidence means they can finally catch the sick bastard who took them!"

Vincent gave her a look. Sympathetic. "You need to put that behind you. It's only going to make it worse, remember?"

She withered now, pain in her voice. She began to rub her hands together.

"She was my granddaughter, Vincent..."

"I know. But this isn't how she'd want you to spend the rest of your days," he assured her, patting her back gently. He began ushering her back to her car. "We have to let go. You know that as well as I do."

The woman opened her car door and sat down in the seat. She absently rubbed the steering wheel with two hands before her features crumbled.

"He took my granddaughter, Vincent..." she said, her voice cracking. "That...monster killed her!" Tears streamed down her cheeks. "And my daughter..."

Vincent wrapped up the newspaper, tucked it under his arm and bent down to her. He smiled soothingly and placed a hand over hers.

"I'm sorry those kids brought back those memories," he said. "That's why I hate it when they come by and ask all of those questions. Just go home and get some tea in you, okay?"

She nodded her head and rubbed her eyes with one hand. "But if there's a chance..."

He smiled a little. "I guess here's to hoping, right?"

A laugh answered him.

Once Ethel drove away, Vincent walked to his car. Then, he winced and scratched at his scar.

O

Mark had gone to an old bathroom stall to relieve himself. He had contemplated using the toilet anyway, but it didn't seem very decent, so he just went in the bottle. The sound of paper shuffling turned his attention toward a stall.

Frowning, Mark approached the stall curiously and tapped it open with the tip of his foot. His eyes widened and he immediately left the bathroom to rejoin his friends.

"Hey!" he called. "You guys have to see this!"

The others made their way into the bathroom with him and they found the stall he was looking into. The group of friends were amazed at what they saw.

Foxy.

The large, crimson-colored animatronic was lying on the toilet. Portions of his faux fur had been rotted away down to the endoskeleton and several of the metal joints looked rusted from age. As the teenagers remembered him, he had a large, sharp hook and dangerous rows of jagged teeth.

Foxy also had a pair of brown linen pants, shredded at the legs. Portions of his machinery were exposed as well as his chest.

He looked like a broken marionette without its strings. And above where Foxy was laying, a message was written.

 _LEAVE ME ALONE._

"Honestly, whoever made that really needs to get a life." Emily snapped. "God, I can't believe this..."

Mark shook his head. He seemed to think about something before Andy spoke up and knelt down in front of Foxy.

"Check it out! Foxy's still here." he said, with a laugh.

Mark furrowed his brow curiously. "I wonder if all of them are still here in the mall. Maybe we should look around." He smiled. "That would be pretty cool if we found all of them."

Suddenly, Foxy's voice box activated, startling the group into jumping back from him.

 _"ARRR!"_ Foxy hissed, his jaw creaking roughly; showers of rust poured from his mouth, _"WELCOME TO *kzzzt* P-PIRATE COVE, LANDLUBBERS!"_

The group of teenagers shared amused laughter. Foxy's voice box seemed to glitch constantly as he spoke, from obvious years of neglect.

"It's just his voice box," Amy said, with another chuckle. She studied the fox for a long time, curious. "It's really neat how he's still running after all these years."

"You know what this means?" Andy asked, raising a finger. "We can find all of them. See if we can auction them off. We can make a lot of money."

The others stared at him as if he was completely insane.

Andy shrugged at their looks. "What?" he said. "Dude, I'm just saying what's real. With that story about the missing kids, people are going to want to pay big bucks if these are the originals."

Amy snorted. "And just how are we going to explain to my mother the thousand pounds of metal and rotting felt in the back of your van?"

"Why would we explain it to your mother?"

"Because she has no idea I'm even here!"

"You didn't tell her?"

Amy scoffed and threw her arms in the air. "What would I say?" She made her voice light with mockery. " 'Oh hi, mom. Guess what? I wasn't really going to the beach. I'm at a famous site where kids were killed and people disappeared! I should be back before breakfast."

Mark held up a hand. "Guys, come on." he chided. "Seriously."

Outside of the bathroom doors, a shape quickly darted by, drawing Dean's attention while the others talking. He frowned and stepped out, looking around. In the darkness, he could have sworn he saw a form of a child crawling away on all fours.

"Hello?" Dean called, his voice cracking out of him.

 _"Remember, I know how scary they might seem, but they just need help..."_

Dean remembered his mother's words that darted across his mind in regards to the things she had seen. What was it he saw?

Dean walked back into the pizzeria and up toward Pirate Cove. A sign was posted nearby that read: "SORRY! OUT OF ORDER!". Child depictions of the animatronics had been drawn and tacked on the wall nearby. It seemed like these pictures were everywhere.

Dean looked around before noticing a set of scratches on the stage. Curious, he bent down and ran his fingertips over them, noticing that they formed perfect spaces for his fingers.

Behind him, the pictures had changed to crude drawings of weeping children.

 _"It's me..."_

Dean shut his eyes when an image filled his mind unbidden. He saw a flash of blood-soaked hands scratching across the stage. The sounds of screams fading in the back of his thoughts. Another flash of someone being sucked screaming into the darkness of the stage.

A cruel giggle.

 _"You shouldn't be here."_

Dean's eyes opened and he shivered with fright. "We shouldn't be here..." he whispered.

Suddenly, the sound of ethereal screams filled the air and Dean watched in mute disbelief as the entire game room came to life.

Cracks formed on the glass of the doors, as if something heavy was thrown at them. Lights began flickering wildly around him. The ghostly, disembodied screams continued; some were even young, like that of children.

Dean panted heavily, watching in horror as a wicked slash ripped the wall behind him. He backed away, stumbling from it and fell onto his ass. Chairs were thrown through the air, a claw machine was smashed by an invisible force.

A mechanical scream.

Dean held his hands to his ears and scrambled to his feet, attempting to flee. But he felt his arm roughly seized and he was forced back against the floor.

He looked up with a gasp as a shadow loomed over him. A shadow of pitch.

Dean's eyes widened and he gave several frightened gasps.

A smile spread out across the shadow. A grin of pure white.

Just then, a groaning sound filled the air. Dean looked out toward the mall and he craned his head to see better.

Something was crawling toward him. Panting and choking.

A wet, sticky sound came from it. Each movement seemed to cause it more pain. It's body shuddered violently.

"Mark!" he screamed, covering his eyes with two hands. "Help!"

 _Help me._

Suddenly, the chaos stopped.

Dean opened his eyes and looked around, struggling to catch his breath. He noticed everything seemed normal. Nothing was flying around, the pictures were not depicting any sorrowful children. The thing that had crawled toward him was gone.

Dean's eyes rolled in his head and he lost consciousness.

O

 _"Save them..."_

 _Dean opened his eyes and he saw himself peering through the eyeholes of a mask again. This time, he looked down and noticed he was wearing a brown suit. He must have been dressed inside a Freddy Fazbear suit._

 _He noticed now that he was holding a microphone in one hand._

 _Dean looked around, noticing that he was standing in the Pizzeria. Everything looked brand new as the day it was built, but it was empty._

 _"Follow me."_

 _The boy looked up at the sound of a soft, young voice, spotting the same puppet that Andy had found in the distance. It looked like it was floating in the shadows, but he could hardly tell from where he was standing._

 _"Wait, what...?" Dean said, unable to fathom what he was seeing._

 _"...Follow me..."_

 _Dean felt himself pulled forward and he started to follow. He didn't know why._

 _A dream._

 _The puppet seemed to drift as silently and gracefully as a cloud, and occasionally stopped to look back to see if Dean was still following. He didn't know why he followed. He didn't have control over his legs._

 _Dean looked around as he passed through door after door, entering different rooms. The first room he passed looked like a parts and service room. Chica was lying on the floor in a disheveled state; her yellow body horribly thrown in tangles. Those eerie eyes seemed to stare at him._

 _When Dean passed it, Chica's eyes followed._

 _"...Save them..."_

 _Dean was following the puppet and heard the soft whisper. He looked around the room - the party room. On the walls, the words: "Save them" had been scrawled in red._

 _Dean continued to follow the puppet and each time he passed the rooms, he began to notice that he was going in circles. He saw the same twisted form of Chica._

 _He noticed the Toy Foxy lying in a heap in a corner. The difference between Toy Foxy and regular Foxy was the terrible, twisted endoskeleton she consisted of. She had a white face, red lipstick and frightening teeth._

 _Dean remembered hearing how the staff of the pizzaria had taken to calling her Mangle._

 _Yeah, that was supposed to be a kid's toy?_

 _Her eyes seemed to follow Dean as he walked by, attempting to ignore what he saw._

 _But each time he passed, the room began to change; the colorful decorations looked as though they were going through a state of decay. Each poster, banner and even the walls and floors looked like they were being peeled apaprt. And he could hear the sounds of children sobbing. But he didn't notice that each picture and drawing the kids had made began to depict the children in them as lying dead in front of the animatronics._

 _Suddenly, he stepped in something damp and stopped, looking down and lifting his foot._

 _It was red._

 _He had stepped in a puddle of red._

 _Dean looked up, but found himself staring face-to-face with the puppet. It's black, lifeless stare filled his entire field of vision._

 _Then, the puppet disappeared and was replaced by the form of a man with a purple security guard's coat. Dean saw the badge gleaming, felt the hands grab him and drag him to a corner._

 _Someone screamed._

 _"You can't..."_

Dean was being slapped across the face lightly by Mark. The others crowded around him and were struggling to wake him up.

"Dean!" Mark shouted. "Dean, get up!"

Dean awoke with a start and looked around sharply. "You can't!" he suddenly cried.

They stared at him in confusion, watching as the teen struggled to take in his surroundings. It looked like he had just received the scare of his life.

"Dude, what's up with you, man?" Andy said, frowning. "We found you laying on the floor."

Dean looked at them frantically, struggling to catch his breath. When he saw the odd looks, read the mild judgement on their faces, he immediately calmed.

"Sorry, I just slipped." he said.

Emily seemed to suspect otherwise, but she didn't speak. "Maybe I should take him home." she suggested.

Dean shook his head. "No, I'm fine." he insisted, "Really."

Mark smiled and patted his shoulder. "Yeah, he's fine."

"Mark, he passed out on the floor." Emily protested.

"I'm fine, Emily." Dean argued, his voice growing much more firm. "I can stay. There's no need to baby me."

He got up and walked away from them, still shaken by what he had seen in his dream and in the pizzeria.

The others looked at each other and Andy scoffed with amusement.

"Damn, someone grew chest hair behind our back." he joked.


	4. Part Four

~O~

 **Part Four**

Amy, Andy and Mark searched for the animatronics while Emily took a seat beside Dean. It seemed like he was trying to distract himself with a game on his laptop. A bag of chips laid beside his leg.

"Hey, I'm sorry for what happened." Emily told him, quietly. "I wasn't trying to baby you, or anything."

Dean made a face, looking up at her apologetically. "I'm sorry for yelling back there."

"What?" Emily looked confused. "You didn't yell."

Dean still looked apologetic, but resumed his attention to his laptop. He looked down at the puppet still lying on the floor near him and placed his coat over it.

Meanwhile, Andy wandered into another party room, stopping to a sign momentarily.

RULES FOR SAFETY:

Don't run.

Don't yell.

Don't scream.

Don't poop on the floor.

Andy didn't even get to finish as he was giggling at the message written there under the rules.

Someone had to have done that for it to be a rule regardless.

"Man..." he muttered.

He continued through the decorated party room and found the remains of what he could only guess used to be Chica.

She had been leaning against the wall, her sphere-shaped head lying limp on her robotic shoulders. A bit of the tuffs on the top of her head had been decayed, revealing the rusted metal of her endoskeleton beneath. Bits of the metal ribs were jutting out through her bib that read: LET'S EAT! in yellow lettering.

Her cupcake was sitting on the table nearby; it had silly, bulging eyes and a single candle topped on its head.

Andy grinned with excitement and approached, kneeling down to study the animatronic.

"Hey! Hey, guys!" he yelled, "Get in here!"

Immediately, Amy and Mark walked into the room and approached him. They were amazed at the sight of the mechanical chicken lying there.

"Wait, was she here before?" Amy asked, tilting her head.

"I don't know," Mark said, "I didn't get back to this room yet. Actually, I don't think any of us did."

Andy leaned close to the animatronic, chuckling. "Man, this chick's seen better days."

"Andy, that was terrible..." Amy muttered.

"Aww, come on. That was good!"

Mark made a wry smile before he studied Chica curiously. "I wonder why they're all over the mall, though." he said, "Maybe someone came here before us and moved them."

"Or maybe they moved on their own!" Andy teased, laughing.

"Dude, that's not funny." Mark snapped.

O

Emily was searching an old clothing store while keeping Dean within sight. Every so often, she looked up and found him still at his computer, distracting himself with his game. She didn't notice the animatronic Bonnie positioned near one of the clothing racks.

But when she turned, she cast her flashlight onto the animatronic. A grin lit her face and she momentarily forgot Dean.

"Whoa." she said. "Look at you!"

Bonnie's condition was the same as Foxy's and the others. His fur was falling off in most places, exposing delicate wiring and machinery. His eyes looked sunken and almost tired. That goofy jaw was open somewhat, revealing rows of silly, flat cartoon-style teeth.

Emily wanted to take a few pictures with her camera, so she held up her phone and turned on the flash, taking a few shots of the animatronic. She moved to the side and looked over her shoulder.

"Hey, Dean!" she called, "Look at this!"

She went to take another photo, but froze.

Bonnie's head was now turned in her direction, looking straight at her.

Emily was frozen, unable to process what she saw.

Bonnie's eyes and mouth began to leak dark fluid. It trickled down the length of his muzzle. Emily backed away in horror and disbelief, struggling to speak and call for Dean.

The faint light of her phone cast a terrible glow on Bonnie's face.

It was blood.

"Dean!" she shouted.

She quickly rushed from the shop, hurrying toward the other teenager. He looked frightened by her reaction and quickly stood up. She struggled to speak, making frantic gestures.

"Bonnie's in there!" she cried. "And he was... Oh God, he was covered in blood!"

Dean looked uneasy now and her shout seemed to gather the attention of the others as they were already hurrying down the escalator.

"Emily!" Mark shouted. "Emily, are you alright?"

Emily pointed frantically toward the clothing store, struggling to speak. Dean looked almost surprised by her reaction. He wasn't used to seeing the others so uncomposed. Normally, it was just him.

"In there?" Mark asked.

A nod from her and he walked into the store with a scowl. "Alright!" he snapped, putting on a tough-guy act. "Whoever's screwing around, just come out! It's not funny!"

He shined his flashlight over toward Bonnie, but the animatronic was back in his usual position.

"Hey, it's just Bonnie." he said, turning to Emily with a smile of relief.

Emily looked horribly confused and furious. "Don't do that. No." she said, approaching the animatronic. "He just did some creepy shit just now!"

Andy rolled his eyes. "Man, if you're freaking out like Dean over here, I can't deal with it." he said, annoyed.

Dean met Emily's stare and she slowly began to relax. "Maybe you're right." she said, rubbing her eyes with one hand. "Maybe it's just this place getting to me. It's making me paranoid."

But clearly, she still believed what she saw.

"Do you actually think this place is haunted, Dean?" Mark asked.

He looked over his shoulder, but Dean was gone. He had returned to his place without a word. Mark frowned a little and looked at Emily, who shook her head.

"He just needs some space..." she said, evenly.

It was hard to tell if she meant Dean, or herself. Mark's frown intensified and the other two winced.

"Awkward..." Andy muttered.

O

Later that evening, Amy sprinted across the parking lot to retrieve some snacks from the van. She looked both ways to make sure no guards were nearby before hurrying back with two bags.

She squeezed through the broken window with the help of Andy.

"Did you see those guards?" he asked.

"If they're out there, I didn't see them." she replied, walking over to the light and generator where the other sat. "So they probably didn't see me."

She handed Dean a bag. "I got your weird voodoo stuff."

Dean made a face. "It's not voodoo. That's a completely different ritual."

"It's really not." Mark said. "They're under the same sort of deal, I think."

"Not helping..." Dean told him, making a face.

He unzipped the bag and removed a few things. "I'm still learning from my mother, but I won't help do this if you guys don't take it seriously."

Mark frowned. "I'm taking it seriously."

"Yeah, you are." Dean said. He looked at Andy sternly.

The others looked at Andy and he met each stare before sighing and rolling his eyes.

"Fine, I won't laugh." he snapped.

Dean nodded his approval. "Alright. First thing's first..."

He pulled out a bundle of sage and a lighter. He lit the end of it and stood up, waving it around them. Andy coughed and the others twisted their noses at the smell of it.

"What the hell is that supposed to be?" Andy demanded.

"Sage." Dean told him. "I'm cleaning out any negative energies around us."

He paused in front of Andy and purposely waved the smoking sage around him many times before the other teen glared at him.

Emily tried not to laugh.

Once Dean was finished, he properly discarded the sage and sat back down in his spot. He took a deep breath and looked at them.

"I'm going to try and speak to any spirits that may be here." he said.

 _Don't._

The whispered warning in the back of his mind had come from the same voice from his dream. He attempted to shake it off and blinked rapidly.

"What, like a seance?" Mark asked.

"Kind of." Dean explained. "My mother was big on using automatic writing in her sessions. I think I can try it."

The air around them grew significantly colder. A chill.

A collection of whispers that had no name.

O

A shape was watching them through the upper floor windows of another shop. Dean was in the middle of scribbling something down on paper, his eyes wide. They were almost rolled up in his head.

"Dude, look at his eyes, man..." Andy whispered, uneasy.

"I can't believe he did it." Amy whispered back.

"Hello..." Dean slurred his words, speaking to someone who wasn't there. "Do you have a name?"

His hand continued to move on the paper. His features twisted somewhat. Emily tried to see what he was writing, but she couldn't in the poor light.

"Oh... I'm sorry." Dean suddenly said. "How old are you, Daniel?"

Continued writing.

"...Seven? Oh, you're so young to die. I'm sorry that happened to you, Daniel. Can you tell us how many of you are here?"

Andy looked amazed, leaning over to Mark. "Is this for real?"

Dean looked a little confused now, despite his eyes rolled in his head. "I'm sorry...how many?" he asked.

Emily leaned down at the paper and looked at the others gravely. "All of them." she read.

"All of them?" Amy asked, frowning at Mark. "What does that mean?" She looked at Dean, despite how futile it was. "Ask them what that means."

Dean continued with his seance. "What happened to you kids?"

A pause, a twist of his features and his face filled with horror. The others didn't see the bloodied figure of a child standing there, whispering in Dean's ear.

"...Oh God..."

"What?" Mark asked, anxiously. "What is it?"

Emily looked down at the paper. Her eyes widened. "A hammer... Wire... Hands." she read. Her features crumbled. "Oh Jesus..."

"Do you know the one who did this...?" Dean continued without pause.

A moment of silence as he continued to write. The silence continued on for a maddeningly long period of time before a loud sound in the distance drew the other's attention from the seance.

"What was that?" Mark asked.

Andy scowled, retrieving a pipe nearby. "Ghost or no ghost, I'm beating its ass."

Emily looked at Dean and he slowly seemed to come down from his trance. His eyes returned to normal and he looked around, still in a daze. He stared down at the paper that spelled out:

THE MAN IN PURPLE.

"'Man in purple'?" he said, "What does that mean?"

He noticed Andy rushing off and frowned. "Where's he going?"

"No time to talk, I have to catch that idiot." Mark said.

It was amazing how no one wanted to talk about what had been written on his paper. But Dean continued to look at them with shock. He met Emily's stare and seemed a bit shaken by this.

"I actually did it?" he said.

Emily nodded. "You did." She noticed how confused he seemed. "Why? Didn't you think you could do it?"

"No. My mother was still showing me how."

"And that's a bad thing?"

"It is. It means there is actually something here."

Suddenly, Andy's shout drew the remaining teenager's attention behind them. They abandoned their spot and followed Mark.

"Andy!" Emily cried.

O

The group rushed toward the direction of Andy's voice, leading them to the KB Toys and were surprised to see him facing off with another person.

It was a brown-haired, scruffy bearded man wielding an old pipe in one hand. He was dressed in tattered clothes with bags tied to them. It seemed like he was standing behind the counter and Andy was trying to goad him into fighting.

"Make a move, old man!" Andy spat.

"Whoa!" Mark said, raising two hands. "Alright! Let's all calm down for a second!"

The man squinted at him now, lowering the pipe slightly. "Really? A man comes at you with a pipe and you want to talk?" he snapped, his voice dry and rough.

Now that the teenagers had gotten a good look at him, they noticed that he had a terrible scar across his cheek and a few teeth missing. He had hardened blue eyes and one of them looked dialated.

"You shouldn't be here!" he hissed, gesturing with the pipe. "You need to leave, before it's too late!"

"Hang on. Just chill out for a second, Jesse Lee Tally." Mark said, attempting civility. "We had no idea you were squatting here. We didn't mean any harm. We're just doing some video recording and that's it."

"Seems like you were doing more than just recording from where I was standing."

Amy looked uncomfortable. "You were watching us?"

"Doesn't matter. You're tresspassing, that's what you're doing." the man snapped, advancing. But he stopped and gestured to the back door where the window had been shattered. "And vandalizing private property, from the looks of it."

Andy scoffed. "What are you, a cop?"

"No. I'm a security guard." the man said, giving him a cold look. He sighed and shrugged. "WAS a security guard, but that's not your business."

"What happened?" Amy asked him, carefully.

The man stared at her, his gaze as cold as stone. "Nothing you need to worry about," he answered. "Now you need to leave. It's for your own good." He gave a snort and turned. "Nothing here to look for but death."

"So why are you here, then?" Emily asked him.

"To keep nosy, thrill-seeking little shits like you from running to your death!" The man whirled on her, fury on his face.

"Oh, come on!" Andy rolled his eyes. "You expect us to really buy into that legend about the robots coming to life and killing people?"

"I frankly don't give a shit what you believe. Now get out."

Mark sighed. "Listen, we're not here to cause trouble." he insisted, "We just want to do some video recordings, listen to a few EVP's and be on our way. No one has to get hurt. No one needs to fight."

The man seemed to think about it. Then, he looked up quickly, muttering to himself; as if the teenagers were no longer there.

"Don't wake them up..." he murmured, starting to walk away. "Can't wake them up. They have to sleep. Stay asleep."

He wandered down the darkness of the mall, still muttering under his breath.

"Should we stay with him wandering around?" Dean asked, looking at Mark.

Mark seemed skeptical about the strange man, but looked at his friends. "We'll be okay," he assured them.

"Mark, are you serious?" Emily said, staring at him in disbelief. "This was fine when it was just us, but we don't know what that guy can do!"

Mark looked at the others for a moment before he took Emily's hand.

"Can we talk about this in private?" he asked, quietly.

"Mark, no, listen." Emily argued, as he ushered her out of earshot from the others. "No, I've had enough of this obsession of yours!"

Mark pulled her into another store across from the others and he looked at her gravely. Emily stared at him, but softened a little when she realized it was more serious than it probably even seemed.

"My brother was one of those kids." he told her.

Emily looked confused. "Wait, what do you mean?"

"The Missing Children Incident," Mark explained, "My mother was just eighteen then. I had an older brother who disappeared from that restaurant. Ten years ago. It took her that long before she had me."

He sighed, rubbing his eyes with one hand before he continued.

"I found the newspaper articles weeks before this trip. I just...I had to know. I had to give my mother closure somehow. It's been ten years, but it still makes her crazy. She never let me go by myself until just recently. I had to know..."

Emily exhaled and put her hands on his shoulders. "Why didn't you tell me?"

Mark sighed, shrugging his shoulders. "I don't know..."

The others watched as Emily and Mark embraced each other. Andy smiled his approval and glanced down at Amy.

"Well, they're not throwing anything at each other this time." he joked.

Dean nodded. "No more drama, I guess."

He heard music then.

A soft, gentle melody that played to the tune of "My Grandfather's Clock". Dean tilted his head curiously and followed the sound. Amy and Andy didn't seem to notice he left because they were already talking to each other.

That song...

That song was so familiar.

Dean wandered into Freddy's Pizza and toward an "employees only" marked door. The music seemed to grow louder here. It called to him somehow and granted him a warmth he'd never known since he was little.

 _Mom's song..._

When he grabbed the knob, the music suddenly stopped. Dean slowly and cautiously opened the door, anticipating the worst, but he found nothing.

Well, except for a music box resting on the floor.

Curious, Dean bent down and picked it up in both hands. It was old, simple and covered in stains. What made it so curious was that it was just a simple, cube-shaped wooden box. Several depictions of the Fazbear Pizzeria had been printed on it. Happy, smiling cartoons of Chica, Freddy, Bonnie and Foxy.

Dean opened it and it began to play the same music again. He smiled.

Another image filled his head.

 _A child clutching the brand-new music box._

 _The music box smashed to bits by a hammer._

 _A scream._

 _"Don't wake him up."_

 _"Don't wake up...Springtrap..."_

Within the locked door where the Spring Bonnie suit rested; it suddenly sat up with a horrific, metallic scream.


	5. Part Five

~O~

 **Part Five**

Several sets of optics powered on.

The horrific scream was heard by the two security guards sitting in their car just near the mall. One of them looked up with a frown.

"Hey, Bill, you hear that?" he asked.

The other - Bill - was in the middle of a game of Flappy Bird. He glanced up briefly with little interest.

"Ted, give it a rest." he said, "I'm about to beat my high score."

"Hey, I'm serious," Ted argued. "I think we've got more kids running around in there. They could be hurt."

Bill laughed sarcastically. "Yeah? Well maybe they should. Teach them a lesson not to go running around in abandoned malls."

Ted scoffed, swatted the phone from his hands, sending it falling to the floor. Bill gave him a look of furious disbelief.

"What the hell?" he snapped.

"Come on, we need to get in there." Ted said. "Do you want to have another dead kid on your conscience?"

He started to get out of the car and looked at his partner with disgust. Bill just sighed and shook his head, stepping out and following him.

"Come on, don't make me feel bad, okay..." he muttered. "You know I never want anything like that."

"I don't make you feel anything. That's all you."

"Shut up."

Meanwhile, another scream had joined the first.

The man who had confronted Andy was running down the mall, toward the pizzeria. Mark and the others had heard and were chasing him down.

"NO!" he shrieked, running up to Dean and snatching the music box from his hands. "Don't play that song!"

"Whoa!" Mark cried, stepping between him and Dean.

Dean, who had barely touched the man's hand got a flash of images.

A man wearing a security uniform.

A gleam of a badge that read "Mike Schmidt".

While the others were arguing and trying to push him away, Dean looked up and spoke.

"You're Mike Schmidt." he told the man.

Everyone stopped arguing and looked at him. Emily frowned at Dean, unable to register what she had heard.

"Wait, what?" she asked.

The man met Dean's eyes and his features turned grave.

"You're the one they said disappeared," Dean continued, holding his stare.

Andy looked at the man - Mike - and his eyes widened. "Oh shit. Are you serious?" he exclaimed.

A loud banging sound - like metal being thrown against metal - interrupted them. They looked up and Mike suddenly looked panicked.

"He's awake." he gasped.

"Who?" Mark demanded. "Who's awake?"

"Springtrap."

The chains that had blocked the door rattled violently before a yellow, faux fur-covered fist punched through the glass.

Mike and the teenagers looked over their shoulders at the sound.

"We need to go, now!" he ordered. "My office!"

O

Bill and Ted wandered through the mall, flashlights on.

"This place creeps me out." Bill muttered.

Ted sighed, shaking his head. "Look, if we have kids running around here, we need to find them and go."

He looked at his partner with a mixture of amusement. "You're not going to tell me you believe that story about this place, are you?"

Bill scoffed. "No, but old places just weird me out."

"Right..."

"Do we even know where to look?" Bill complained, wanting to change the subject. "This mall is enormous. They could be anywhere. Why'd they even build a mall this big for a town this small?"

Ted leaned to one side, frowning when he saw a figure walking around the corner on the second floor. "Hey!" he called. "Hey, you!"

The figure continued to walk.

Ted and Bill walked up the escalator and spotted Springtrap walking just a few feet ahead of them. His steps were harsh and done with great effort.

Ted exhaled and shook his head, approaching.

"Alright, you've had your fun, now get out of that suit and come with us." he ordered.

Springtrap stopped, his eyes flickering before he turned; each twist of his rotted limbs groaning in the process. That terrible, grinning mouth clicked once. Twice. He regarded the two guards with an almost human intellect.

Ted scowled now, losing patience. "Yeah, we get it. You're mad-dogging us." he said, bored. "I'm tired of you kids playing these stupid games. You're trying to scare us. It's not working. Get out of the suit right now."

Springtrap continued to stare.

Ted sighed, walked up. "Last warning." he snapped, poking Springtrap's chest. "Get. Out. Of. The..."

His hand went through one of the rotted holes in Springtrap's chest. Ted groaned with disgust and pulled his hand out, coming back with sticky strings of gore.

"What the..." he groaned.

He looked up at Springtrap, whose eyes seemed to glow in the poor light of their flashlights. Suddenly, the animatronic seized him by his head with two hands and twisted, snapping his neck.

Bill stared down at the corpse that fell to the floor, eyes wide in horror. He looked up at Springtrap, unable to process right away what he was looking at. The animatronic looked at him. Those eyes...

The man turned and ran.

Springtrap gave a low, almost human-like hiss before following him.

Bill had unfortunately dropped his flashlight in his attempt to run, leaving him alone in the dark. Springtrap was not far behind him. Bill whimpered with fright, rounding a corner and tripping, falling flat on his face.

Pain shot up every inch of his head and blood poured from his mouth from where his front teeth had cut into his lower lip. He struggled to his feet, moments as Springtrap's shadow fell over him.

Bill mumbled, attempting to scoot away from the animatronic. Those wide, horrific eyes almost seemed to glow red.

"N-No!" Bill begged, through his bloodied lips, "Leave me alone! Please!"

Springtrap continued to stalk toward him, even as he scooted far against the wall, struggling with the pepper spray on his belt; a pitiful line of defense for a desperate man.

Springtrap slowly reached out with one hand.

"Who are you?" Bill shrieked, "Who in the hell are you?!"

Springtrap paused, lowered his hand slowly. Bill stared down at the hand with a mixture of confusion and fear. He was still shaking, still so frightened.

The animatronic leaned away slightly and began reaching up with two hands toward his metal jaws, groaning an almost a human-like sound.

Once he opened his jaws entirely to Bill, a new look crossed the man's face. He went from confusion and fear to raw horror. The pepper spray canister slipped from his fingers and fell to the floor.

 _"Look at me..."_

The eyeless mummified skull that stared back at him from inside the machine shrieked, overlapping Bill's agonized screams.

O

Mike led the group of teenagers to his office, quickly shutting the door behind him.

The room itself was filled with television monitors that overlooked the entire mall. Cans of food, crates, and a matress pushed into a corner with sheets and pillows piled onto it.

"Okay, seriously, what the hell is going on?" Mark demanded.

Mike looked at him coldly. "Do I need to draw it up in crayon for you, boy?" he snapped, "This shining example of human intellect played the music box!"

He gestured to Dean with a swift flick of his wrist.

"And now, we're ALL dead!" Mike finished.

The sound of a scream drew their attention upwards. Amy was suddenly looking very uneasy.

"What was that?" she asked.

Mike turned his focus to the television monitors. He pressed several buttons and noticed the movement of Foxy first as the animatronic fox stepped out of the bathroom.

The teenagers watching couldn't believe their eyes.

"Wait... That's not possible!" Amy cried.

"We need to get you kids out of here," Mike said, his voice softer now.

Dean looked worried. "Maybe we should listen to him."

Andy gave a laugh. It was derisive. "Really? We're going to listen to the guy who tried to beat at us with a pipe?"

Mike made a face. "I hardly tried to beat anyone..."

"Uh, guys?"

They looked at Emily and she gestured to the screens. They looked up and almost withered at the sight of Bonnie staring into one of the cameras. It was an unsettling sight and the animatronic's wide, toothy grin seemed to stretch across the screen.

"We need to go." Mike said, calmly.

Dean shook his head slowly, staring at the grinning form of Bonnie in the camera. He saw a flash cross his field of vision.

The Golden Freddy Fazbear.

"How are we going to get out?" Amy asked, frightened.

Mike turned to a crate and began to dig his way through it. He started pulling out hollowed-out heads of the animatronics. Andy picked up a Freddy Fazbear head and gave it a sniff before grimacing.

"You need to wear these." Mike told them.

"Are you crazy?" Andy protested.

"No, but I am losing my patience," Mike said, giving him a dirty look. "Now these masks will fool most of them. But not Foxy or Springtrap. If you can make it to the front doors and stay together, you can get out safely."

He started to go for the doors, but was stopped by Mark.

"Wait, we're not leaving until we get answers!" he said.

Mike sighed, turning and giving him a warning look. "Which won't matter if they get you. I think you know what I'm talking about."

Each teenager was given a hollowed-out head to wear.

"Now put them one and follow me. Stay close. If you get separated, you die."

Mike fitted a Bonnie head over his own and took a pipe in his hands before opening the door slowly.

"What about flashlights? We can't see in the dark!" Amy whispered frantically from behind her Mangle mask.

"Hold onto each other." Mike whispered back.

Each one of them clutched the other's jacket. And Mike let them out into the darkness of the mall.

O

So far so good.

There were no signs of the animatronics so far, and the trip through the mall seemed to be going smoothly.

"I can't see them..." Amy whispered.

"So far so good..." Mike whispered back, "Stay quiet."

They continued on, breathing heavily through their masks. But then, Amy looked down and gave a small, muffled cry.

"What?" Mark exclaimed, "What is it?"

The others looked down and noticed Bill's corpse lying facedown on the floor in a pool of blood. The back of his head looked as though it had been crushed.

"Oh my God!" Emily whispered, frantic.

"Keep quiet!" Mike hissed.

The sounds seemed to draw Bonnie's attention as the animatronic was stepping out of a shop, letting out a haunting moan.

"HI! It's me Bonnie!" it's voice box seemed to play back the default greeting the animatronic was known to have. "Welcome to - to - to - " His voice box continued to glitch, filtering through unpleasant groans and cries of agony.

"Stay. Calm." Mike warned them. "He doesn't see us."

As Mike had said, Bonnie seemed to show no interest in them and wandered into another store, knocking over books and shelves.

There was a groan and Freddy Fazbear wandered nearby, walking passed the group. His eyes seemed to focus on them, with an almost curious intent.

"He knows..." Mark whispered.

"Shut up." Mike whispered back.

Freddy studied the group, tilting his head. Those black, metal eyebrows formed alm almost human expression of curious wonder.

Dean could faintly hear a collection of haunting whispers in the back of his mind. He struggled to stay focused.

Bill's corpse suddenly sat up, speaking slowly, as if in a dream-like state. The left half of his face had been caved in and his bloodied jaw moved gruesomely.

Dean struggled not to look at it _._

 _"I should have watched them. I should have made sure they didn't go inside the mall..."_ Bill mumbled. _"I deserve to be punished... All of us do."_

Dean struggled to calm his racing heart. He shut his eyes before opening them once again. Bill's corpse was back at its proper position and not at all sitting up.

"The doors should be this way." Mike told the teenagers.

 _He's coming._

Foxy stepped out of the nearby store, jaws snapping and hook flashing. He hissed, leaning toward Andy. That hook hand raised up and Andy was left with no other choice but to duck out of the way.

"Shit!" Mike shouted.

Foxy shrieked triumphantly, an unholy mixture of metal and human. Mike quickly moved away from the teenagers, tapping the pipe against the floor.

"Foxy! Look here!" he called, attempting to draw his attention away and continuing to tap the pipe. "Look at me!"

Foxy seemed to lose interest in them and focused on Mike, teeth wide in a almost happy grin.

"Mike!" Amy cried.

Mike gestured wildly. "Go!" he ordered. "I'll lead him away!"

Foxy gave a roar, chasing him down into the darkness of the mall. The teenagers made their way back toward their spot where their gear was located and Dean began to fill his bag with the equipment.

"Dean, hurry it up!" Emily told him.

"I am!" Dean hissed back.

Once he managed to get his equipment into the bag, he gathered his coat and noticed that the puppet was gone. He looked around wildly for it.

"Dean, hurry!" Mark ordered.

"The puppet..." Dean said, hesitantly following.

They rushed for the front doors, but ended up colliding with nothing but wall. Andy frantically patted the wall.

"Wait, the door!" he exclaimed, "Dude, where the hell's the door?"

"This isn't the door, idiot!" Emily spat, frantic.

Slowly, their sounds began to interest Freddy and Bonnie, who slowly turned from their places they had been searching.

"This can't be the right way!"

"Shut up! They're going to hear us!"

Amy suddenly looked back and screamed, seconds before Bonnie was behind them, swinging his signature guitar.

They had ducked out of the way and it collided with a fusebox, sending showers of sparks raining down and the animatronic into uncontrollable, electrified spasms.

Amy quickly fled in fear, disappearing into the darkness.

Andy caught sight of this. "Amy! Wait!" he shouted.

"Is she crazy?" Emily shrieked.

Andy chased after Amy into the darkness of the mall. The others made a mad dash to chase after them, narrowly missing Freddy, whose laughter faded behind them.

Meanwhile, Mike had managed to lose sight of Foxy and was making his way through the mall when he spotted Springtrap on the other side of the second floor. The animatronic was staring at him, those eyes glowing eerie yellow dots.

For a moment, they just stared each other down in silence. Springtrap's jaws clicked together and Mike pursed his lips.

"Do you think it will stop?" he asked it. "Do you think hurting any more people will make it all go away?"

Springtrap just continued to stand there in silence. There was a faint dripping sound and Mike noticed the blood that dripped from Springtrap's hands.

The night guard.

"How many guards will you kill?" Mike continued. "How many will it take to stop the rage?"

Springtrap disappeared into the shadows and Mike faintly heard a brief, sinister chuckle fill the air.


	6. Part Six

~O~

 **Part Six**

Amy was hiding in the food court, behind the counter of an old Subway. She managed to peek her head over the corner, whimpering. Pulling out her phone, she used the source of light to look for signs of danger. She still felt so exposed, even behind the safety of the counter.

Foxy appeared around the corner, hissing and she ducked down with a barely muffled yelp. The sound caused Foxy to look sharply toward the counter. His optics flickered and his teeth seemed to widen in a grin.

Amy clasped her hand over her mouth, moaning in fright. She pressed her back against the counter, not noticing Foxy looking down at her from above the counter top.

Something fell onto Amy's shoulder. She looked down, noticing it was bright red. She reached out and touched it with two fingers.

The sound of a hiss drew her attention upwards and she screamed. Foxy dove at her, but she managed to roll out of the way and into the kitchen, seconds as Foxy had a face-first encounter with the floor, getting tangled in a mess of robot limbs and parts.

Amy rushed through the kitchen, listening to the sounds of Foxy's terrible screeching. He staggered into the kitchen, his head twisted at a funny angle.

"ARR! Come aboard, lass! I just want to - " A demonic, deep voice channeled through Foxy's voice box. " - _kill you_!"

He grabbed his head with a hand on one side and his hook on the other before twisting it back into its proper place.

He stalked around the kitchen in search for her and with how small it was, Amy was given no other choice but to hide behind the kitchen counter. Foxy started to search the pantry and Amy took the chance to flee back through the kitchen door.

The animatronic fox looked back and his optics glowed bright with rage.

Meanwhile, Andy was searching for Amy through the employee corridor. "Amy?" he called, "Dude, this is seriously messed up! Where are you?"

Just then, he could make out a peculiar sound. It almost reminded him of metal buckling.

Or someone shrieking.

It sounded faint, distant.

Andy squinted suspiciously.

Suddenly, his phone began to filter through loud, startling static. Andy jumped, but pulled his phone from his pocket and stared down at it in disbelief.

"What the hell?" he exclaimed.

He pressed several of the buttons before focusing his attention to a radio sitting on a desk in an adjacent room. It filtered through the same exact noise. Andy could have sworn he heard voices coming from it.

 _"...little boy..."_

 _"...missing..."_

Andy furrowed his brow and a loud thumping from the ceiling made him stare upwards. Banging. As if someone was frantic to get out.

"...Amy?" Andy said, carefully.

Suddenly, the ceiling caved, sending bits of plaster, dust and debris falling to the floor. Andy backed away quickly, shocked to see Mangle among the mass. She screamed at him, long and loud.

He recoiled and raised his arm to his face, just as Mangle tried to lunge for him. But the wires impeded her movements. She looked back at the mess and tried to pull her twisted, endoskeletal arm free, but to no avail. Several attempts and almost frustrated human grunts; Andy suddenly grinned; he started laughing when there seemed to be no threat.

"Y-Yeah!" he shouted, feeling bolder now, "You ain't biting me today, creepy ass robot! You ain't BITING ME!"

He continued taunting Mangle, saying "You ain't biting me" in a sing-song voice and clapping; his ridiculous antics had him failing to see Springtrap now standing behind him, those eyes almost glaring.

"Whatcha got now...Tangle?" Andy taunted, waving his hands out daringly.

He laughed before finally sensing something behind him. Slowly turning, he noticed Springtrap and all of his bravado disappeared.

"Oh shit..." he groaned.

Springtrap grabbed his shoulder and threw him into a storage room. Andy was sent sliding across the floor and colliding with a garbage can. Springtrap stalked toward him, feet slapping on the floor.

Andy quickly grabbed the nearest item he could find - a broom - and smashed it across Springtrap's face. It merely earned a grunt from the animatronic, and a stare that seemed more bored than angry.

Andy grunted, scooting far from Springtrap onto the other side of the room. "Come on, ugly!" he taunted, "Bring that nasty face right over here!"

Springtrap slowly tilted his head at the gesture.

Andy charged with a roar, smashing the broom across Springtrap's face as hard as he could. The machine doubled over slightly and Andy yelled triumphantly.

Springtrap righted himself with a gruesome crack of his joints. He straightened his head a few times before glowering down at Andy.

The animatronic seized Andy by the throat, lifting him off of his feet. Andy struggled to breathe, feet kicking out uselessly beneath him.

Springtrap watched as the teen grabbed uselessly at his arm and a horrid, dry chuckle escaped him.

 _You like to play games, do you?_

Andy stared down at the animatronic in horrified disbelief. That voice... Did this thing really just speak to him?

 _Let's play._

With that, he tossed Andy into the wall and the blow knocked him out.

O

Andy struggled to regain his senses. He mumbled weakly, watching the ceiling overhead pass him by.

"Wh-What are you doing...?" he groaned, looking up in a daze as Springtrap dragged him down the hall by his leg. "Let me go, man..."

His vision was blurred, his head hurt so bad.

He lost consciousness a few moments later.

Once Andy regained his senses, he couldn't move. He looked around, murmuring. He was in the parts and service room, lying on the floor with his back against the wall.

Something smelled absolutely foul.

Andy looked down and his eyes widened in confusion as he found himself in an old, smelly Freddy Fazbear suit. This one was yellow, much like the head he'd used to scare Dean with. A Golden Fazbear.

 _I wouldn't move if I were you._

Andy looked up, spotting Springtrap approaching with the Golden Freddy head. But this one was different than what he'd used before. It had wires sticking out of its empty eye sockets, several patches of faux fur rotted away and a few missing teeth.

"Hey, what are you doing?" Andy demanded.

Springtrap continued to approach, his wide grin seemingly stretching to both corners of his face.

 _Don't move._

Andy looked down and he saw it then; several metal pieces deep within the suit. A spring-lock suit.

"No, no..." he cried, shaking as Springtrap slowly lowered the Freddy Head over his head. "No! No!"

Springtrap just watched him, leaning forward and staring deep into the teenager's eyes as he whimpered with fright. Andy saw nothing in the room except for Springtrap. Those lifeless, animatronic eyes.

Andy shook, sweat beading down his brow.

His frantic movements, his sweat and the water dripping from the ceiling...

The sounds of his fear were abruptly silenced by the sudden snapping from the spring-locks.

O

Vincent was driving down the dark road and his attention was briefly diverted toward the van parked in the trees. It seemed that one of the kids he'd seen forgot to cover it back up.

He pulled over along the side of the road and stepped out of his car, casting his gaze toward the mall.

He sighed.

Oh well. Such a shame.

O

Dean, Emily and Mark were trying frantically to search for their two missing friends. Strangely enough, they saw no signs of Mike or any of the animatronics.

"Andy!" Mark whispered fiercely. "AMY!"

"They're not answering," Emily said, fear straining her voice, "What if they're dead?"

"DON'T say that!" Mark hissed. "No one's dead!"

A soft moaning sound filled the air, immediately freezing the trio where they stood. They looked around frantically.

"What the hell was that?" Emily gasped.

She removed her flashlight from her coat and cast the beam around their vicinity. Eerily enough, no animatronics were around.

The moan continued on and it almost sounded like someone pleading for help. Mark looked up and noticed a figure staggering toward them from the other side of the second floor. Emily shined her light on it and it was the Golden Freddy suit moving.

Mark sighed, annoyed. "Andy, are you kidding me?" he snapped, making his way around to the other side.

Emily and Dean took the opposite side to corner their idiotic friend.

The Golden Freddy figure seemed to be limping, groaning in pain. Occasionally, grabbing its neck and reaching out almost beseechingly.

"Andy, I'm going to kill you!" Mark snapped, approaching. "You're seriously playing games with us when we got this screwed up shit going on?"

" _'elp 'e.._." Andy's voice croaked from the suit.

He sounded sick; as if he was gurgling on fluid. But Mark seemed to consider that all he was doing was playing games with him.

"Get this mask off!" he said, frustrated.

While Mark struggled to get the mask off, Emily approached and her foot slid on something slick. She almost fell if not for clutching the railing and Dean catching her.

They looked down, noticing an almost black trail of fluid on the floor. They followed it toward the Golden Freddy suit, which the back seemed almost drenched. Emily's voice caught in her throat and she shined her flashlight down.

Blood.

 _"'elp 'e..."_ Andy groaned again, _"It -ur..."_

"Mark..." Emily whimpered.

Mark didn't listen, anxiously trying to help Andy out of the suit. His eyes widened in furious disbelief.

"What the hell, is this welded on?" he cried. "Andy, how the hell did you get this thing on your head?"

"Mark!" Dean hissed frantically.

Mark scowled at them. "What?" he demanded.

Then, his frustration drained away when he noticed the pool of blood at his feet, gradually forming from the cracks and holes in the old suit. He backed away, lifting his foot before peering at Andy's eyes through the empty holes of the mask.

Tears had poured down Andy's frightened, pained eyes and blood soaked the corners of the empty sockets around them.

 _"...'lease..."_ he moaned.

Then, Emily looked beyond Mark, noticing Springtrap not far away. His eyes were nothing more than little red pinpricks in the dark.

"Mark!" she shrieked.

Mark attempted to release Andy, frantic despite how useless it was. "Andy, I'm sorry!" he cried, struggling against Dean and Emily's grip as they tried to pull him away, "I'm so sorry, man!"

They rushed into the darkness of the mall, leaving Andy to fall to the floor. He reached out after them, moaning a high-pitched, frightened whine.

Springtrap promptly walked on his head and followed the trio.

O

Amy had run into the party room, choosing to barricade the door behind her moments as Foxy slammed into it. She backed away, screaming.

"Go away!" she cried.

Foxy beat on the door several times; it almost sounded like the metal groaned under his assault.

Or was the groaning coming from him?

Amy clutched her hands at her face, failing to notice Chica still laying in a heap behind her. The Cupcake was sitting on the table, its wide silly eyes turning to look at her.

"Stop it!" she shrieked out at Foxy. "Leave me alone!"

A few more vicious beatings to the door and eventually, the sounds stopped. Amy backed away, confused and terrified.

Slowly, Chica's head turned, looking right at her.

"This can't be real..." Amy mumbled. "This can't be real..."

She backed away, tripping and falling right onto Chica, who immediately wrapped her large, metal arms around her.

Amy shrieked and Chica's optics brightened. Her beak opened wide, as if delighted with her capture.

"Hi there! I'm Chica!" her voice box played, "Let's eat - eat - eat - " A deep, terrifying voice filtered through between hollow screams and whispers, "YOU."

Amy screamed.

The sound carried through the empty mall, where the animatronics roamed. Their voices filtered through static sounds of macabre delight.

Mike could hear the scream from his place in the employee lounge. He was struggling to retrieve some things from an old locker before he paused, lifted his head.

"Couldn't resist playing games, could you?" he said, to someone standing behind him. "You never had any control."

No response.

Mike chuckled, turning to face the shape standing in the doorway. "They will find you. You're the one they need to stop all of this."

Again, nothing but eerie silence.

"I'll make sure they have you," Mike promised, his features darkening. "And we can both be taken together."

He paused when he received no reaction once more.

"I've seen you do things to those kids. I know what you are. And it ends tonight."

The figure slowly removed a long, dangerous knife. The tip of the blade reflected dimly in the poor light coming from the glass window overhead.

"You're absolutely right, Mike. It ends tonight."


	7. Part Seven

~O~

 **Part Seven**

Somehow, Bonnie had joined the chase.

The animatronic bunny had filtered through a stream of goofy cackles from his voice box. Dean rushed into a music shop and Springtrap followed.

"Hiya, kids!" Bonnie could be heard talking with Mark and Emily. "Wanna play something special?"

"Eat me!" Mark shouted back.

It would have been a little funny if the situation wasn't life or death. Dean kept himself between a shelf and Springtrap, who seemed to study him intently.

"You killed Andy..." Dean said, struggling to calm his voice. "Why? What do you want? Why do you kill?"

Springtrap simply stared at him, his enormous grin seemingly widening.

Dean tried a different tactic. "I-I know you're all trapped here," he stammered. "Maybe I can help. I can help set you free!"

Springtrap tilted his head at him and reached out, but Dean quickly rushed out of his grasp and dove behind the register counter. He struggled to search for a possible weapon while Springtrap advanced.

Dean grabbed anything he could find; from ashtrays to empty bottles. He threw them all at Springtrap in a useless attempt to wound him. Each item bounced off of the animatronic's head.

If Dean wasn't so terrified right now, he could have sworn the machine almost looked bored with his attempts.

"Oh shit!" Dean cried.

Suddenly, someone rushed into the shop, prepared a wicked-looking taser and shoved it into Springtrap's neck.

An almost human scream burst from the animatronic and his body was contorting in gruesome bends and twists. Gagging sounds could be heard and Dean spotted the terrible, mummified skull inside the creature.

He collapsed to the floor in a pile of smoking metal and Mike was standing there, clutching his abdomen. He was soaked in blood.

"I'm getting too old for this crap..." he muttered.

Dean smiled in relief and climbed over the counter, rushing up to him. He gingerly stepped over Springtrap and studied the man in confusion.

"Mike!" he said. "Oh shit, you're bleeding!"

Mike hissed sharply before nodding. "Yeah, kinda got that already..."

Always so sarcastic.

"Listen, you need to get out of here..." Mike told him, groaning weakly. "Springtrap's out like a light, but he won't be for much longer."

"But Mike - " Dean protested.

Mike sighed, rolling his eyes. "You need to go! I can handle them. I have before."

Dean hesitated for a few moments longer before he rushed from the store. Mike watched him go before he sighed and collapsed beside Springtrap. It was almost amusing how they laid side-by-side.

"What a night, huh?" Mike said, chuckling through blood-soaked teeth. "We should have been paid overtime for this."

He laughed weakly at his joke.

O

Dean ran through the mall, calling desperately for his friends. He passed a shop that housed television monitors in the window.

Suddenly, they all switched on and Dean stopped, frozen by them. They filtered only static, but he could swear he heard voices coming from them.

 _...It's me..._

The televisions flashed the message a few times and Dean was greeted with brief, second images of nightmarish versions of the animatronics; sharp teeth, razor fingers and decayed bodies.

Dean backed away from the television screens, fear in his gasps.

Then, he could briefly make out the sound of a telephone ringing. Confused, Dean followed the sound and it led him toward the employee hallway. Dean moved slowly, cautiously toward an office; a corded phone was sitting at a desk, ringing away.

 _Answer it, Dean._

That voice. That same voice that had come from the puppet from his dreams. Dean was compelled to obey and disobey all at once.

He slowly and carefully picked the phone up, bringing it to his ear.

"H-Hello?" he said.

 _"Hello!"_ an eerily cheerful male voice answered. _"Happy seventeenth birthday!"_

Dean was lost and frightened. But he decided to play along. For whatever reason. "W-What? It's not my seventeenth birthday. Who is this?"

 _"It IS your birthday!"_ the cheery voice took on a brief, darker edge. _"And don't think I don't know what game you're playing. You ran away! I had a cake, balloons and presents for you! Why did you run away?"_

Dean swallowed thickly, not sure how to answer.

The voice was happy once more. _"That's okay! You were afraid. I understand. It can be scary sometimes, but I'm your friend. I won't hurt you! No one can be hurt at Freddy Fazbear's! I can promise you that!"_

A disturbing giggle followed and Dean looked around warily. He picked up the phone and walked toward the door, straining to see into the hallways as far as the cord would allow him to.

"Who are you?" Dean demanded, attempting strength in his voice.

 _"I'm your friend."_ the voice over the phone said. _"Until the end."_

The laughter that followed made Dean slam the receiver down with a cry of rage and disgust. Then, he could make out the sound of a music box. The same music box he had heard before starting it up and causing all of this.

Dean peered down the corridor and he could hear it louder now. As he walked slowly and followed the sound, he turned the corner and spotted Mangle still hanging from the ceiling.

His eyes widened and he gasped softly, but in his approach, his cell phone began to filter static.

Mangle heard the noise and lifted her head, staring at him silently. She made no effort to attack him as she had Andy. She only...stared.

Dean held the stare of the monstrosity in front of him, carefully moving around her. Mangle watched his movements, her good optic following him.

 _...I want my mom..._

 _...He's a bad man..._

 _...H-He's a really bad man..._

Dean heard a young, female voice hanging in the air, through ribbons of static sound. Dean met Mangle's mismatched gaze and for a second, he watched the creature's jaw hang slack in an almost human expression of sadness.

Sadness.

That wasn't possible.

 _Follow me._

Dean looked over his shoulder and peered back around the corner when he heard a banging noise. Foxy was surging through the doors, letting out a furious scream.

Dean gave a groan. "Give me a goddamn break, will ya'?" he shouted skyward.

But he turned and ran down the corridor, Foxy hot on his heels. Everything hurt from constant running and his lungs felt like they were on fire.

He turned another corner and spotted double doors ahead of him. Light was shining through the cracks and he had hoped it was morning and he could escape from the animatronic fox.

 _Hurry._

The voice that had come from the puppet in his dream urged him on. Dean no longer cared if it was a trick or not. Anything to get away from Foxy.

He ran through the doors, immediately greeted by a bright light.

O

Grass.

Dean felt warm grass against his cheek. He opened his eyes and noticed he was lying on lush, green grass.

But he wasn't in the parking lot of Fazbear's Galleria. Instead, he was lying in a field of grass that was home to a single tree.

"Hello, Dean. You made it." the voice from the puppet was back, much more rich here, "You did well. So I think it's time I told you the truth."

Dean turned and a younger boy was standing there. He was probably seven years old with short blonde hair and brown eyes. He was wearing a black suit with white buttons and striped socks. So properly dressed.

But he looked odd. His skin was deathly pale and his face looked as though it was streaked with evidence of tears.

"Who are you?" Dean asked, wary. He looked around. "What is this place?"

The boy held out his hand for him to take and Dean reluctantly did. He was led down the hill nearby, where he spotted a diner just below. It looked isolated from the rest of the world. A single fragment of memory.

Dean followed the boy toward the building and he was amazed to see that it had a sign reading "Fazbear's Family Diner". He glanced down at the boy briefly.

"What is this?" he asked.

The boy's features filled with sadness. "Where it started."

Dean looked into the window, noticing children in the middle of a party. Then, before he knew it, he and the boy were now inside the diner. People passed them without a second glance. Children were eating cake and a man in an older Freddy Fazbear suit walked by.

Dean couldn't fathom what he was seeing. The boy was just calmly watching it all play by, as if he had done this many times.

Then, Dean saw the boy in the window, looking in at the party.

He glanced down at the boy at his side, wondering what sort of reaction he would see. But there was nothing but sadness there. The boy in the window was crying and clutching a music box.

Dean's eyes widened. He noticed that the music box in his hands looked exactly like the one he had found in the pizzeria.

A flash of memory.

And image of car headlights.

A man wearing a purple uniform stepping out.

The same boy failing to see the gleam of a knife.

Dean looked away and a muffled scream pierced his head. He looked down at the boy, who did not react to this image.

"I was the first one. The first of the Man in Purple's victims." he said.

The image around him changed to that of police scrambling to search for him. Dean saw another flash of memory. The boy's image printed in the newspaper and the headline of "SEARCH FOR MISSING SEVEN YEAR OLD BOY".

A name. "Daniel Bowers".

"Daniel..." Dean said, softly.

The boy looked up at him briefly before they were standing in a dark room, lit by a single bulb above. On the floor was the puppet.

"I hid away for a while." the boy told him, staring down at it. "But then they came here to this mall. And I followed."

Dean saw the mall for when it had been first opened. The garbage, rust and filth seemed to vanish and in place was a bustling galleria filled with laughing kids, parents, employees and most importantly, security guards.

The puppet was seen sitting in the prize corner of the pizzeria, watching people pass by. Dean frowned curiously, tilting his head.

"For a while, things were good." the boy continued. His features fell and he sighed. "I wasn't angry. Not like the others... I was just sad."

The puppet's tears almost looked like real human tears among the shadows of this new memory.

"The others..." Dean pondered. "Do you mean the animatronics?"

The boy looked up at him and nodded his head.

O

Dean noticed that the same man in purple showed up inside the pizzaria. He was wearing a badge that gleamed almost menacingly in the light.

"Then, HE came..." the boy continued.

Dean wished that he could see the face of the man, but he had his back to them. The man seemed interested in staring at a young girl across the way toward Kids' Cove. The girl looked up and smiled brightly, but then her smile disappeared and she looked frightened; her image was immediately replaced with an image of Mangle, who screamed with rage.

Dean gasped, jumped back with fright.

"Lucy Frost. She was the youngest." the boy said, shaking his head sadly. "Only six years old."

Dean saw an image now of the girl - Lucy - running down the employee corridor, crying and pleading for her mother. The man was right behind her, giving chase and wearing a Golden Freddy head.

"He only wanted to hug her." the boy continued. "But she was scared and ran. He didn't like that. Not one bit."

Dean squeezed his eyes shut, not wanting to see what happened next.

 _...I want my mom..._

 _...He's a bad man..._

 _...H-He's a really bad man..._

Dean saw only fragments.

The girl cornered and the man's shadow looming over her.

Another image of something being stuffed haphazardly into the ceiling by the man, who was now covered in blood.

Mangle screaming at him.

"Stop..." Dean begged, covering his eyes. "I don't want to see any more."

The boy seemed emotionless toward his pain. Instead of stopping the images, he continued to show each victim to him. Like a gruesome compilation of death and pain.

"Adam Barnes. Nine years old. He had cornered him in the bathroom."

Dean saw an image of a bathroom door being slammed. Saw a flash of Foxy lying there.

"Jacob Marlow. Ten years old. He had tried to hide from him in parts and service. That was bad. Very bad."

Dean was greeted with an image of a screaming boy being seized by the man who was dressed in a Golden Freddy suit. He had tried to gouge the man's eyes out with his fingernails and once released, he ran into the music shop where he was cornered behind the counter.

A haunting, ghostly scream.

An image of Bonnie followed, lying in a heap in the music shop.

"Anna Smith. Ten years old. She had fallen asleep in the party room. She was much easier for him."

What horrified Dean was an image of the child in question sleeping beside a plate of cake. Hands grabbed her from behind and dragged her screaming away.

Another flash of an image of Chica, leaned against the wall. Where he and the others had found her.

Dean began to understand now. Every animatronic they found had been left at the place of their death. They were caught in the cycle, trapped in an endless loop of pain and fear.

"I tried to help them." the boy said, with a heavy sigh. "I put them in a safe place. Where no one could hurt them."

Dean saw only a glimpse of the spirits that inhabited the animatronics. He saw them in their final stages. Bloodied, bruised and lifeless. Their haunting faces hidden behind the empty masks of Foxy, Mangle, Chica, Bonnie and Freddy Fazbear.

"It's an itch. A bad itch you can't scratch."

Another memory, showing Foxy lunging at two teenagers who had trespassed in the mall. Dean tore his gaze away as one of them was impaled with Foxy's hook. Their screams faded away into shadow.

Bonnie cackling as he pursued another man, who desperately tried to hide beneath a table. The table was flipped over by the robotic rabbit and the man screamed, raising his hands to his face.

Each and every memory was of an animatronic killing someone. Probably someone who was not deserving of their death.

"What about Springtrap?" Dean asked, after a memory disappeared before him. "How come I can't see him?"

The boy exhaled and spoke with greater wisdom than Dean would have expected.

"The one you call Springtrap wasn't always who he is now."

The memory changed now, revealing a security guard walking through the destitute mall. A flash of memory and a closeup of his name badge.

F. Smith.

He was walking around with a flashlight in hand. From Dean's perspective, this guard seemed kind and friendly, especially given the way he was sending a message through his phone. A warm smile lit his face.

Dean looked over the man's shoulder out of curiosity to see the message.

I MISS YOU DADDY.

The man chuckled and sent a message back.

MISS YOU TOO, HONEY. BEHAVE FOR YOUR MOTHER AND GO TO BED.

Another text was sent shortly afterwards.

JUST ONE STORY?

Smith rolled his eyes with amusement and dialed a number. Dean didn't heard what he was saying to the person on the other end, as the memory cut out in a swirl of clouds and smoke.

"There were good people who came here too. People like you, Dean." the boy continued, "People who though they could help."

The image of Smith had become distant in the smoke. One side of him was human, the other was the terrifying image of Springtrap.

"But their anger was stronger than his kindness..."

Dean watched the next memory unfold. Smith was running frantically through the darkness of the mall. He found himself cornered in the game room, where a Spring Bonnie suit had been discarded.

Dean wanted to warn him. "No!" he cried.

"It's just a memory, Dean." the boy reminded him.

Dean didn't want to look, but he could help but stare as the memory unfolded before him.

Smith climbed frantically into the suit, failing to notice the water dripping down onto it. He held perfectly still as the animatronics stepped into the room. His voice shook frantically and sweat beaded down his brow.

"Please..." he moaned, to no one in particular, "Help me..."

Suddenly, Dean heard the familiar snapping of the springlocks and the agonized scream from Smith. He couldn't look away as the man in the suit writhed and fell into a puddle of his own blood.

The animatronics simply watched in silence as the man was left on the floor, his raw screams burning forever in Dean's mind.

Smith reached out beseechingly, his arm soaked in blood.

"Please..." he croaked.

Dean saw nothing but those frightened, agonized eyes staring at him.

"They watched him die," the boy continued, without hesitation, "They watched him suffer for someone else's sins. And so it continues..."

Dean looked down at him as they were suddenly left in pitch darkness. The only light came from the eyes of the puppet at his feet. Dean bent down to retrieve it and he looked up, just as the boy disappeared.

He could still hear his voice.

 _"Be careful, the man in purple is here..."_ the ghostly, haunting sound of the boy's words emerged from the puppet.

Dean's eyes widened.

 _"He comes to play with your friends. You have to warn them."_

Dean shuddered, holding the puppet close. He was terrified. What could he possibly do to help any of them?

The puppet's voice offered only the smallest of encouragement.

 _"It's okay to be afraid, Dean."_

Dean watched as the world around him transformed before his eyes. He was now standing back in the corridor and the animatronics were gone.

The last words the puppet ever spoke to him were soft...sad.

 _We were all afraid._

O

 _Note - When I wrote the scene out of Dean being shown images from the puppet, I thought of it playing as a compilation to Marilyn Manson's "Sweet Dreams"._


	8. Part Eight

~O~

 **Part Eight**

Dean wandered down the corridor, making his way back toward the mall. He wrapped the puppet's arms around his belt to keep his hands free. Then, he saw Mangle still hanging from the ceiling. She looked like she was just...hanging there, her single good eye closed.

When Dean got close enough, Mangle's eye opened and she quickly looked in his direction. Dean quickly held up two hands.

"It's okay!" he said, "I'm not going to hurt you."

Mangle continued to stare, her good eye squinting at him.

Dean took several cautious steps forward. "I...saw what he did to you. To all of you." he continued, "I'm sorry. I know that isn't really helpful now, but I'm sorry."

Mangle didn't respond. She simply watched him like a tethered, angry dog.

Dean glanced up toward the mess of wires Mangle had been wrapped up in. He looked briefly down at the puppet and considered the boy's words.

"Uhm, do you want out of that?" Dean asked Mangle, gesturing to the wires with one finger. "I-I can help you."

No response, just a cold, angry stare.

"Help?" Dean tried, realizing how ridiculous he must have sounded and looked. But right now, he really had no other option.

He looked around for a moment. "If I had a pair of scissors or...wire cutter, maybe?"

Dean entered an office nearby and rooted through a desk, cursing at the lack of useful items before he found a toolbox nearby. After going through it, he found a pair of wire cutters. He grinned triumphantly.

"Awesome!" he said.

He stepped back out and showed Mangle the cutters in his hand. "It's okay." he soothed, raising his other hand to show he meant no harm. "I won't hurt you."

Mangle stared at him before her eye focused on the cutters in his hand.

A flash of memory.

 _A man was kneeling in front of the girl, smiling behind a Bonnie mask._

 _"It's okay..." he crooned, with a wicked chuckle, "I won't hurt you."_

 _His knife gleamed menacingly in his hand._

Mangle's cold stare transformed into a frightened one, her eye narrowing to a small pinprick. She suddenly went berserk, screaming and thrashing. Dean narrowly missed a swipe of her huge claws before he looped his arm around her large muzzle.

Mangle's screams were constant, metallic and loud; like a car alarm that had gone off in the middle of the night.

Dean struggled to keep her from biting him. He almost lost his grip on the wire cutters.

"It's okay!" he shouted, over her screams. "I'm not trying to hurt you!"

A hollow, ethereal collection of frantic voices filled his head.

 _...Don't hurtmeDon'thurtmeDon'thurtme..._

 _Please, stop..._

 _Let me go._

Dean didn't realize he'd been crying; out of frustration, fear, he didn't know. But all he knew was that he had to get Mangle free.

He cut through the wires with his free hand, almost being dislodged by the massive jaws clicking at him.

Once the wires were cut, he quickly released Mangle and tossed the cutters behind him, out of sight. He raised two hands, backed away to give Mangle space, just as the animatronic fell to the floor in a mess of tattered wires and metal.

Mangle twisted a little, calming somewhat. Her body bent and moved like a living puzzle. Dean noticed that she had a secondary head that resembled a metal eel. It also had one eye like she did and tiny sharp teeth. And a little pink bow around her neck.

Her endoskeletal form was rusted with age and one of her hands was a massive white paw that ended in claws.

A put-together and pull apart attraction.

Sick.

"We're okay." Dean assured the machine, "It's all okay."

He waited, hands raised close to his face should Mangle change her mind and attack. He had little room to run around her. The puppet did offer him some form of comfort in an odd way, especially since the boy that inhabited it told him the truth of these creatures.

 _They're just frail, scared children. Remember. That's all they are..._ Dean thought, trying to keep himself strong.

Mangle righted herself, shook the wires from her body, leaving only a few still caught in several gaps of her exoskeleton frame.

Then, the machine looked at him.

For a moment, there was only the meeting of stares. A silent understanding.

"I want to help you..." Dean said, "And I need to help my friends. But...I don't know how I can. I don't even know what this...purple guy looks like."

Mangle glanced behind her only briefly before she walked away, her metal feet slapping the ground beneath her rather loudly.

"Hey, wait!" Dean called, following the creature.

Mangle ran on all fours, hurrying toward the pizzaria. She glanced back briefly at Dean, seeing if he was following before making her way toward the place where he had been playing Skee-ball.

"What are you looking for?" he asked.

 _Man in purple..._

Dean wasn't sure where that voice had come from, but he watched as Mangle leaned her great head down, retrieving a drawing that had fallen to the floor. She caught it in her teeth and laid it at his feet.

Dean looked down, noticing the drawing depicted an all-purple coloring of a man with several children. He looked down at Mangle, who stared at him almost expectantly.

"Yes, I know. Purple guy. I don't know who he is." he told her.

Mangle walked over and caught his jacket sleeve in her teeth, nearly dragging him toward the office nearby.

"Whoa! Hey!" Dean cried, "Stop! Listen, I need to find my friends, I can't - "

He grunted when Mangle released him and watched as she clawed at a filing cabinet. She seemed anxious to get it open, but there was a lock.

"Wait, is there something in there that could help?" Dean asked.

Mangle looked back at him, giving a long, screeching hiss. Dean winced and covered his ears with two hands.

"Okay!" he cried. "I get it!"

He approached the filing cabinet and tried to pry it open with his fingers, but hissed and removed them, rubbing his jacket a few times to soothe the sore sensation.

"Dammit, it's locked."

Mangle seemed to twist her head a little in a gesture that almost reminded him of sarcasm. Great, an animatronic with a sense of humor.

Dean looked around, patting the counter-top. He found a small, hand-held crowbar and smile his approval.

"Yes!" he said, triumphantly.

He pried the filing cabinet open and found nothing but old folders, documents and photos. He furrowed his brow, finding it awfully odd that these things were still here. Mangle butted her nose into him and he grunted.

"What?" he asked, anxiously, "What do you want me to see?"

Mangle dipped her nose into the folders and retrieved one of them. Dean took it from her and opened it, paging through the photos and documents.

Slowly, his eyes widened in absolute horror.

"Oh my God..." he whispered.

He dropped the folder and quickly sprinted from the office, Mangle rushing to catch up with him.

"Emily!" he shouted.

Lying on the floor was an employee document and a photo of Vincent clipped to it. Only he was younger, had a short, stubble beard and long hair.

O

Mark and Emily hid inside of a supply closet.

"Where's Dean?" Emily whispered frantically.

"I don't know!" Mark hissed.

"What do you mean, 'you don't know'?" Emily cried, "You lost him?"

"I didn't see you looking back either!"

Emily groaned in fear, clutching her head. "Jesus Christ, what are we going to do? What if they killed Dean too? Oh my God..."

She was practically hysterical, muttering under her breath. Mark watched her for a few moments before he peered out of the supply closet, peeking through a barely formed crack in the door.

"I don't see them..." he whispered.

"What do we do, Mark?" Emily was almost at tears. "What do we do?"

Mark hesitated, considering her words before he looked down at her. "Okay, remember the stories? About this place? If those things are up and moving around, then my brother has to be in one of them."

Emily stared at him in horrified confusion. "Mark, what are you talking about?"

Mark reached into his coat and removed and old photograph of a boy sitting on a tricycle. Emily stared down at the photo, not realizing that the boy in question was one of the few ghosts who haunted the animatronics.

"His name was Adam Barnes." Mark told her. "If it's true and he is in one of those things - "

"Mark..." Emily groaned, "That's crazy!"

"So what, then? Sit here and wait for them to kill us?" Mark hissed. "I have to try something! WE have to try!"

Emily hesitated. It seemed absolutely insane, but what other options did they have right now? They were outnumbered and clearly cornered like rats.

"Alright." she said.

The pair stepped out of the closet and slowly walked out into the mall. Mark raised the photo and looked around, calling out for the machines.

"Hey!" he yelled. "I'm here! Listen, I know one of you used to be my brother! So come out!" He paused, hesitated for a few moments. "You don't have to do this!"

After several long minutes of silence, Bonnie was the first to emerge from the escalator. Emily and Mark looked up with gasps.

A curious giggle escaped Bonnie's voice box. Soon, Chica joined, then Freddy Fazbear and finally, Foxy.

They circled Mark, like a pack of wolves ready to tear him apart. Freddy giggled maniacally and Bonnie grinned. Chica laughed with delight and Foxy snarled.

Mark struggled to calm himself, raised two hands before holding up the photo at them.

"Adam?" he said, carefully. "Adam Barnes?"

Foxy stopped moving.

Mark looked down at the robotic fox, who seemed to be frozen in place, as if someone had pushed the "shut down" switch on him. Mark cautiously and carefully held out the photo in front of Foxy's eyes.

"Adam, I know you don't know me, but I'm your little brother," he said, smiling sadly, "I came to find you."

Foxy didn't move for the longest time.

When the fox finally did, he was reaching out for the photo. The other animatronics had stopped too and were looking at him.

Foxy tilted his head, staring down at the photo. His jaws clicked. His gears whirred. The only sounds in the mall. They were so loud in the silence.

Mark held his breath. He waited for anything at this point.

Foxy chuffed slightly before he moaned.

The moan grew louder and louder, but sounded less machine and more human. Then, he screamed and the sound was definitely like that of a child. Not a machine.

Mark's eyes widened and he took a step forward. "Adam?"

Foxy recoiled, as if he had been burned. His long claws dug into his jaws and he continued to moan. Emily watched the scene warily.

"M-Mark?" she said.

When Mark tried to reach for Foxy, the animatronic swung his hook, slicing through the palm of his hand.

Mark's scream could have very well raised the dead. He staggered back, gripping his arm as blood poured from the wound in fountains. Emily tried to go to him, but he shook his head, urging her away as he was seized violently by the machines.

"No! No, no!" he cried, "RUN!"

Emily didn't hear him. She was screaming desperately, trying to pull him free. The animatronics seemed less interested in her and more into their screaming, bleeding toy in their clutches.

Mark kicked out, dislodging her from him. She fell to the floor and Mark could only stare at her desperately through the mass of metal and fur.

"RUN!" Mark screamed. "RUN!"

Emily was in tears, struggling to breathe as she could barely manage to her feet. She turned and ran, panting and crying.

Mark smiled weakly, closing his eyes as the animatronics began to tear into his body like wild animals. He screamed until his throat went raw. He only saw them through a red haze of agony. Their wide, glowing optics. Their hideous, deformed grins and the rotted chrome skulls beneath.

 _It's okay, brother. I'm here now..._

O

Dean hurried through the mall with Mangle by his side. He spotted Mike only a few feet away and quickly rushed to his side.

"Mike!" he cried.

Mike grunted, letting out a pained breath through his nose. He opened his eyes slightly, looked at Dean and chuckled.

"I'd like to thank you kids for a great weekend, I really would..." he muttered, coughing a stream of blood from his mouth.

Dean looked around and Springtrap was gone. "Where's Emily? And Mark?"

"Your friends?" Mike asked, groaning once. "Probably getting themselves killed."

He let out a laugh and Dean scowled at him. "Where are they?"

"What the hell are you asking me for? I'm not your goddamn keeper!" Mike hissed.

He let out a stream of coughs and Dean struggled to stop the flow of blood he saw with his coat pressed tight to Mike's abdomen. His eyes widened and he looked at the man worriedly. Now, a change had come over Mike's face. A look of sorrow.

"I didn't want this to happen..." he mumbled. "Not to anyone. Stupid kids, I was trying to save you!"

He noticed Mangle, and the animatronic stared silently down at him.

"All of them..." he finished.

Dean nodded his head. "Mike, I'm sorry." he told him. "But you have to tell me how to help. I'm just...one kid. I can't do it all myself."

Mike sighed softly, closing his eyes with a smile. "Hell, kid; you're the only one who makes sense in that stupid group of yours. That's why the puppet picked you."

Dean looked down at the puppet still attached to his belt.

"Look..." Mike said, clutching his abdomen. "Don't worry about me. I've been ready to go for a while. Besides, no one's going to save me. Not after what I let happen. So go and find your friends. Set those kids free so no one else has to die again."

Dean stared down at him sadly. He looked at Mangle, who seemed to be staring intently down at Mike.

The man sighed and then chuckled as Mangle walked around him and laid down by his side. She rested her head across his chest and Dean smiled.

"Thank you," he told the machine. "Stay with him."

He turned and rushed into the mall, but not before returning for the pipe that Mike had laying nearby.

"Might need this..." he said, to himself.

Mike watched him go and then smiled at Mangle.

"Sorry, kid..." he told the machine, "I couldn't be as much of a help to you."

Mangle let out a rattling sigh and just stayed with Mike as he lived out the last few minutes of life.

But at least he wasn't alone.

O

 _Note_ \- I ALMOST didn't write the scenes with Mangle because they felt too cute. But fuck it. The scenes with her were specifically put there since my cousin's favorite animatronic is Mangle. So endure. LOL.


	9. Part Nine

~O~

 **Part Nine**

Emily was still running. She almost made it to the door when she spotted...

Vincent?

She was confused by his presence, but far too relieved to finally find help to really consider why he was here.

"Hey!" she cried, "Oh, thank God!"

She ran into his arms and started talking frantically, in clear hysterics and Vincent looked a little surprised.

"Whoa, whoa!" he said, attempting to calm her. "Slow down. Breathe a bit, okay?" He chuckled gently, raising an eyebrow. "Now, tell me what's going on and why you're in this mall so late at night."

Emily struggled to speak and collect her thoughts. "M-My friends..." she murmured, "My friends... Those machines!"

Vincent stared at her with amusement. "Are you trying to tell me those animatronics are up and moving around?" He chuckled now. "You do realize that can't happen, right?"

"It happened!" Emily cried, tears streaming down her cheeks. "They're still here now! We have to go and get help!"

She tugged Vincent's arm, but he didn't move. Emily looked back at him, completely confused. She stared down at his hand, released him and noticed that she had bright red blood on her palm. Emily's eyes widened in horror and she looked down at Vincent, noticing that his shoes were sprinkled with blood and his arm that she'd grabbed was soaked in it.

Something changed in his expression. He smiled at her, but it was like watching someone change masks. His eyes changed too. Became something much darker than the bored, irritated stare from the man in the gas station.

Emily started to run, but Vincent moved just as quickly. She tried to scream, but he wrapped one thick arm around her throat.

"Shhh..." Vincent soothed, struggling a little; she squirmed like a wriggling eel. "No, no, don't scream. We'll get to that later."

Emily grabbed uselessly at the arm holding her, but her struggles began to slow and her eyes rolled up in her head.

"That's it." Vincent crooned, "Good girl."

Emily helplessly stared at the doors that led to her freedom before she slowly lost consciousness.

When she awoke, she could hear Vincent happily humming a song nearby. Emily struggled to move, but she noticed that her arms had been tied down to a pillar, rendering her unable to move.

Vincent appeared in her field of vision, wearing a paper plate mask that a child had made. It looked almost like Springtrap.

"Hello!" he greeted, with a delighted laugh.

Emily grimaced with discomfort, looking away as he giggled again. Vincent removed the mask and smiled at her.

"Ah, I'm really happy you're here." he told her. "I haven't had someone new to play with in a while."

Emily whimpered, struggling against her bonds.

"See, I normally don't like teenagers," Vincent continued, retrieving his knife from his pocket, "But parents are too careful these days."

Emily stared at him, shaking. "Was it you?" she asked, "Were you the one who killed those kids?"

Vincent smiled brightly. "Yep!"

He said it with such pride and delight that it made her physically sick. He reminded her of a child himself; someone who had done something completely immeasurable and wanted to boast about it to the world.

"B-But why?" Emily asked, horrified.

Vincent sighed. "They always ask 'why'." he said, pacing and shaking his head. "When it's always 'how' that's so much more interesting."

Emily looked up beyond him, and she began to notice that the animatronics had started to appear on the top floor. They were standing there, their eyes glowing in the dark. Simply...watching.

"Since you seem like the kind of girl who pays attention," Vincent continued, "I suppose it won't hurt to tell you. The legend of Foxy...Freddy Fazbear...Chica...Bonnie...Mangle. The story of them running around and killing people?"

He smirked. "I made that legend up. I knew that nosy little out-of-state kids like you couldn't resist coming here and seeing for yourself."

Emily noticed Springtrap now. He was standing at the top of the escalator, just watching the interaction between them.

"So you'd have all the victims you want." she said, "And then you - "

"Do you like games?" Vincent suddenly asked, losing interest in this conversation. He had been toying with his knife while she spoke.

Emily looked hopelessly confused. "W-What?"

"Games!" Vincent said, looking at her as if she should have known. "You know, like the ones we have at the restaurant!"

Emily didn't know how to answer.

Springtrap tilted his head.

"I-I don't know..." she stammered.

Vincent smiled, leaned on his knees in front of her. "See, I drove out here hoping to find a bit of a game to play. I mean, you kids sure did give me a workout! And old Mike? I didn't even know he was still here!"

He laughed now, delighted.

Emily struggled against her bonds and Vincent straightened. He sighed through his nose and shook his head.

"You don't look like you want to play games." he said, with disappointment. "In fact, you look like you want to run away. I really hate when they run."

He suddenly drove the heel of his foot down on one of her ankles.

Emily let out a horrible scream of agony. But he didn't stop. He continued stomping on her leg until the bone shattered beneath his foot. Vincent laughed with glee and Emily howled and wailed in pain. She stared down at the ankle he had assaulted; the leg was horribly bent to one side and blood soaked her jeans.

"Aww, what are you screaming for?" he sneered, "Mike dislocated one of my fingers! You don't see me screaming."

He held up his hand for emphasis and wiggled his finger.

Tears streamed down Emily's cheeks and she laid there, whimpering. Vincent leaned down at her and raised an eyebrow.

"Still want to run?" he asked. "Or are you going to play the games right this time?"

Emily was sobbing softly. "P-Please..." she begged.

Vincent groaned, rolling his eyes. "God, you are really boring." he muttered. "Not at all like the younger ones."

He straightened, held up his knife to her chin and sighed. "Alright, you win some, you lose some."

He raised the knife and Emily's eyes widened.

But suddenly, a brutal hand closed around Vincent's wrist.

O

Emily and Vincent stared in shock at Springtrap. The animatronic was holding Vincent's arm so tightly, he was forced to drop his knife.

Vincent's eyes widened in shock and disbelief.

"Who the hell are you?" he hissed, wincing.

Springtrap grabbed him by his face before throwing the man far from Emily. Vincent slid across the floor with a yell and struck the end of the escalator.

Emily watched the sight with a mixture of pain and joy.

"Emily!" Dean cried, rushing up to her.

"Dean..." Emily moaned, never being so happy to see him until now. "You're alive."

Dean quickly hurried to untie her bonds and he looked down at her leg. "Come on, we need to get out of here!"

"He saved my life..." Emily mumbled.

Dean looked confused. "Who?"

"Springtrap. He saved me."

Vincent climbed to his feet and started to run, but Foxy was already there, screeching in his face. He tried to go around him, but Chica stepped in his path. Before he knew it, every machine was there, surrounding him.

Even Mangle, who let out a warbling, metallic scream.

Dean helped Emily stand, but she winced and he threw her arm over his shoulder so he could help her better steady herself. They stood and watched as Vincent was being surrounded by the animatronics.

He tried to get around them, but Bonnie giggled and pushed his shoulder with one hand.

Vincent panted, frantic to get away. He looked over toward the two teenagers, his eyes wide. Now, there was fear.

True fear.

"Wait!" he cried. "Help me! Please!"

Dean stared coldly back at him. "Funny. I'm sure that's exactly what they said, too."

Vincent stared in disbelief, moments as Freddy's huge paw clasped over his face. He struggled and screamed as the animatronics grabbed him. They cackled, squealed and screamed their delight.

But Dean didn't see the machines. He saw the cold, vengeful children who grabbed him instead. The dark, empty glares on their bloodied, ashen faces. The same tear, streaked cheeks that the boy who resided in the puppet had.

The unsympathetic way they stared down at the squirming, screaming man was chilling. Chica held Vincent's jaw, but instead of Chica, it was a young girl glaring down at him. It was a glare full of purpose.

Their killer.

In their grasp.

At last.

Springtrap stared at the teenagers before he gestured with a flick of his head.

 _Go_.

Dean returned the nod before they made their way to the doors. But not before he stopped and gave one final glance back at the sight.

Springtrap was gone, and in his place stood Smith. The man who looked just like the kids. His uniform in tatters, bloody and broken. He just smiled at Dean, a parting thank you in his stare. It was nice to see the man behind the machine. The one who had been falsely killed for Vincent's sins.

Then, he smirked coldly down at Vincent.

Dean noticed the spirits of other victims standing around the scene, watching silently and solemnly. Mark was among them, a broken and bloodied ghost.

He met Dean's eyes and nodded once.

 _Take care of her..._

Dean watched as Vincent was carried away by the animatronics, his screams fading into the dark.

Emily groaned in pain and he quickly carried her through the doors. The sun was about to rise over the horizon.

He looked down at his watch only for a moment.

6:00 AM.

It was almost morning.

"Come on, Emily..." he told her, "Let's just get home."

He stared briefly down at the puppet on his belt.

 _All of us._

O

The animatronics were screaming, cackling and shrieking with delight.

Vincent could see nothing more but their disfigured, wide-eyed grins in his field of vision. He managed to look back and see Springtrap following silently behind them.

Every so often, he saw flashes of the children and Smith.

 _Vincent...It's time to play, Vincent..._

Smith spoke the words from Springtrap's decayed form. Smith's bloodied lips as he smiled emotionlessly.

Vincent was being carried to Parts and Service. He noticed Golden Freddy standing there, a shade of Andy. Still bloodied and broken. He silently pointed to the chair nearby, where Vincent had sometimes brought his victims.

And now his victims would bring him here.

Andy slowly removed the Golden Freddy head, revealing the bloodied skull beneath. He gave a horrid, mad cackle and Vincent recoiled from the sight, gasping with fright.

"I killed you!" he snarled, as he was forced violently into the seat. "There's no coming back! There's NO COMING BACK!"

His shouts went by ignored by the machines, who held his wrists down to the armrest of the chair. As an added bonus, Foxy stomped on his feet.

Foxy let out a wild, mad giggle. "Arr! This landlubber! This..." Static. A demonic snarl of rage. "... _MONSTER_..." More static. An animatronic giggle. Then, another fierce snarl. " _...will never see the light of day again_!"

Vincent screamed again and again as Foxy's stomps crushed his feet into nothing more than bloodied, mushed piles of bone and flesh. His body shook violently in shock and pain and Freddy forced his head back with one violent yank of a hand.

Mangle paced around him, snarling and hissing.

 _Be gentle with your new toy, kids..._ Smith whispered something in the far corner of Vincent's mind. _We don't want to break him quickly, do we?_

Vincent looked around for Springtrap, but he could barely move his head from Freddy's grip.

"Let's teach this stowaway a lesson!" Foxy's voice box played a particularly dark message next, " - a lesson _in pain!_ "

Bonnie's giggle filtered through a collection of nightmarish screams and snarls.

Freddy began to play a music box version of Georges Bizet's the Toreador Song from the opera "Carmen". His signature jingle.

Mocking him.

They were mocking him.

Bonnie's voice box filtered through more haunting whispers. "The Fazbear Band is here!" he processed through his default message. "And we're all a-a-a-a-a..." More static and a demonic hiss. " _ANGRY_."

Vincent looked up at the sight of Springtrap approaching him with a Freddy Head in his hands. It had a little top hat and bright pink cheeks. Vincent's eyes widened and he shook his head frantically.

"No!" he shouted. "NO!"

Springtrap placed the head over Vincent's head. The man could only stare through the eye holes as the animatronics stared back. Including Golden Freddy.

 _Time to play, Vincent._

 _...Time to die..._

The only sound that remained was Vincent's frantic panting noises.

Finally, the spring-locks in the head snapped and abruptly silenced him.

 _"Can you hear me...?"_

 _"...You're broken..."_

Whispers.

 _"We are still your friends."_

Mocking, cruel laughter.

O

Dean was driving.

He occasionally glanced over to Emily, who had fallen asleep with her face leaned against the window.

What would they do now? Where would they even begin?

He looked into the rear view mirror, watching the mall slowly begin to vanish over the horizon as they drove further and further from it.

Within the mall, Vincent was now long dead; still seated in the chair, head tipped forward lifelessly with the Fazbear head over his.

He looked like a grotesque king, broken and bloodied.

Finally, the door before him slammed shut and Springtrap's dry, raspy chuckle was all that could be heard.

After a few moments, Freddy's jingle started to play.

O

 _Note_ \- One chapter left to go!


	10. Part Ten

~O~

 **Part Ten**

 _One Year Later_

Dean sat in his bedroom, headphones over his ears as he worked on his homework.

The puppet had found a home on his desk, overlooking the entire room. Dean only looked up briefly at it every so often.

The puppet hadn't spoken to him since he had left the mall. Dean understood, really. Maybe the spirit within it had finally found freedom after the death of the Purple Man.

Things hadn't been easy since they returned.

Dean remembered how his mother had been. She was angry with him beyond all measure, but that didn't compare to the questioning they'd received by police, investigators and practically the entire town.

The FBI had been involved. Dean remembered how that had been. Hours upon hours of questioning, before finally, it had ended once they found Vincent's body inside the mall. As well as Mike's.

Still in the same place the animatronics had left it. The assumption had been that Vincent had killed Andy, Amy and Mark. Given the circumstances, Dean knew it was best to simply let them believe that.

Mike had been given a proper memorial service in his honor. Dean had explained that it was Mike who had saved them. And Mike who had been scrutinized by authorities for every disappearance.

Dean's mother had been furious by his going to the Fazbear Galleria, but she had simply been happy to see him return.

It was Emily who struggled the most after the incident. She rarely left her house and spent most of her days painting pictures of what she had seen. Dean remembered how her parents had to walk at her side for graduation.

But with his mother beside him, they decided to visit the mall so that way Emily could lay flowers down for Mark, Amy and Andy. It had been hard for her to leave and visit the place again, but she wanted to do it.

Dean remembered how the demolition of the mall had been stalled due to the murders that had taken place. And most crews didn't want to get involved with it. So it had been difficult to be rid of the cursed building for an entire year.

It was important to never forget what had happened.

Emily knelt down in the grass, staring down at the photos of her friends she had brought with her. Dean sat down beside her and his mother simply studied the mall in silence for the longest time.

"Is he here?" Emily asked, after a moment of silence.

Dean looked around, noticing nothing off about the surrounding area. It took only a few moments before he spotted Mark's bloodied spirit standing on the other side of the glass doors.

His mother smiled. "He's here." she said.

Emily rubbed her eyes with one hand.

Mark's spirit vanished from the window and reappeared beside them. He stared sadly down at Emily before looking up at Dean.

 _I'm sorry..._

Dean looked down at Emily. "He says he's sorry."

Emily shook her head, almost at tears.

Dean put his arm around her shoulders to comfort her. His mother sighed sympathetically. She noticed the Golden Freddy standing nearby and chuckled. Dean looked up too and spotted the shade. He smiled a little when he noticed Amy's spirit appear. She had the back of her head missing, presumably from a bite.

"Hey, guys..." he said.

Golden Freddy took Amy's hand in his great paw.

A collection of whispers filled Dean's head. None that he could understand entirely, but possibly because Andy and Amy were both talking together.

Andy's voice was distorted and far more mechanical, like radio feedback. It echoed richly in Dean's head.

The occasional twitch of Golden Freddy's head.

Andy.

Still trying to scare in death.

Dean couldn't help his laugh. It wasn't very appropriate, sure; but Andy actually didn't seem as sad as Mark was. Strangely enough, neither did Amy. Those two were still together in the afterlife in some form.

A soft giggle and they disappeared.

Dean's mother exhaled. "The anger that resided within this mall has lifted. But there are souls here who will always stay."

Emily didn't understand what that meant, but she said nothing.

Dean stood up and looked around, noticing several more collections of flowers people had placed near the mall. They had surrounded nearly the entire area surrounding the building.

So many people.

So many lives destroyed.

His mother helped Emily to stand and walk her to the car. Dean followed.

But just before they were about to leave, Dean noticed a flier sitting between the windshield wipers.

He picked it up and studied it.

Slowly, his eyes widened and his hand began shaking.

His mother and Emily caught the look.

"What?" Emily asked. "What's wrong?"

Dean showed them the flier and their eyes widened at the advertizement.

 _FAZBEAR'S FRIGHT: THE HORROR ATTRACTION._

 _OPENING SOON!_

 _Local Galleria is getting ready to scare your socks off with a new attraction based on the mysteries of the murders that took place in Freddy Fazbear's Pizza!_

 _Featuring actual relics from the old pizzeria, this new attraction is guaranteed to bring back your childhood in the worst possible way!_

Emily shook her head with anguish.

"Oh God..."

The three looked over their shoulders to the mall.

Freddy's jingle could faintly be heard inside.

A soft, childlike laugh.

 **END**


End file.
